Saturday, March 13, 2021

the older I get, the millions more photos I see a year, and the fewer cause me to wonder wtf I'm looking at. But this one did

https://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/threads/vintage-shots-from-days-gone-by-part-2.1154030/page-209#post-13266921

6 comments:

  1. Looks strangely like a ships funnel.

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    1. it is, click the link. The SS United States.
      But it's also the same shape, and ratio of height, width, and length as a submarine sail (that part on top of the cylindrical body)

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  2. I immediately saw it as Submarine conning tower. braking the surface of the ocean. Roughly the size of a nuclear powered sub?

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    1. the most common nuke sub now, is the 688 class, and they are 33 feet around, and this funnel must be about 60 feet tall... but a 688 sub is 362 feet long... and this seems to be about 80.
      At first glance this is exactly the shape of a subs tower, that's certainly why I kept looking at it

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  3. The two stacks were defining characteristics of the ‘Big U.’ The ships designer, one William Francis Gibbs, a lawyer by profession initially (at the insistence of his father, a prominent attorney himself), self taught himself naval architecture and founded Gibbs and Cox Naval Architecture. Gibbs was a remarkable, amazing man. As a law student Gibbs spent most of his time sketching ship designs, vowing to himself he would design the fastest ship on the planet one day. And that he did. The SS United States set a record between New York and Europe on her maiden voyage (1952), a record (three days, 10 hours and a few minutes) that still stands. Every day she departed or arrived at the United States Lines terminal Gibbs in his floppy fedora was there to pay respect. Gibbs deliberately designed the funnels to their specs so no one would ever confuse the Big U with another vessel. “A Man and His Ship,” a delightful read.

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