Liners' Luck

Few minutes before 4 o'clock one morning last week passengers on the S.S. Havana woke up with a sharp jolt. Three hours later when they were called for breakfast they learned that hard luck had again overtaken the Ward Line. Stuck on a shoal 60 mi. east of Jupiter Light on the Florida coast was the S. S. Havana. While the passengers were eating breakfast Captain Alfred W. Peterson sent an SOS. While they were dancing the rumba in the lounge, he let down an empty lifeboat to test sea conditions. He found them rough. But the Havana was pounding, threatening to break up. Taking no chances, Captain Peterson lowered two boatloads of passengers, lowered four more when the Southern Pacific liner El Oceano arrived. Of the Havana's 51 passengers, all were saved but one man died of apoplexy in a lifeboat. Fifty of the Havana's crew of 126, including the purser, were survivors of the Ward Line's Mono Castle.

Threading its way up Manhattan's crowded East River one night last week with 126 passengers aboard, the Colonial Line steamship Lexington (New York-Providence) sighted the freighter Jane Christenson dead ahead, shrilled a warning. Before the Lexington could get out from under the freighter knifed her amidships, nearly broke her in half. While the ship's orchestra played "Somebody Stole My Gal," passengers waded across decks knee-deep in water. Tooting furiously, harbor tugs bustled to the Lexington's side, took off passengers & crew almost before they knew it. The Lexington sank in ten minutes, took four seamen with her.

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