Design and construction
The RMS Oceanic was built at Harland and Wolff’s Queen's Island yard in Belfast, as was the tradition with White Star Line ships, and her keel was laid down in 1897. She used the luxury over speed strategy, which first began with the Cymric in 1897. She was named after their first successful liner RMS Oceanic (1870) of 1870, and was to be the first ship to exceed Brunel's SS Great Eastern in length, although not in tonnage. At 17,272 gross register tons, the future "Queen of the Ocean" cost one million pounds sterling and required 1,500 shipwrights to complete. However, Oceanic was not designed to be the fastest ship afloat or compete for the Blue Riband, as it was the White Star Line's policy to focus on size and comfort rather than speed. Oceanic was designed for a service speed of 21 kn. She was powered by two four-cylinder triple expansion engines, which were when constructed the largest of their type in the world, and could produce 28000 ihp.[3][4][2] In order to build the ship a new 500 ton overhead gantry crane had to be constructed at the yard in order to lift the material necessary for the ship's construction. Another innovation was the use of hydraulic riveting machines, which were used for the first time at Harland and Wolff during her construction.[2]
Oceanic's bridge was integrated with her superstructure, giving her a clean fluid look; this design feature would be omitted from the next big four White Star ships, RMS Celtic (1901), RMS Cedric, RMS Baltic (1903) and RMS Adriatic (1907), with their odd but distinguishable 'island' bridges. "Nothing but the very finest" was Ismay's policy toward this new venture.[5] The architect Richard Norman Shaw was employed as the consultant for the design of much of the interiors of the ship, which were lavishly decorated in the first-class sections.[2] Oceanic was built to accommodate 1,710 passengers: 410 First Class, 300 Second Class and 1,000 Third Class, plus 349 crew.[2] In his autobiography Titanic and Other Ships,[6] Charles Lightoller gives an account of what it was like to be an officer on this vessel.
Her passenger accommodations were laid out in a manner similar to that of Teutonic and Majestic, with First Class amidships, Second Class situated at the aft end of the superstructure and Third Class divided at the forward and aft ends of the vessel on four decks; Promenade, Upper, Saloon and Main. First Class occupied spaces on all four decks, most of which was dedicated to an array of spacious and comfortable single, two-berth and three-berth cabins. There was a library on the Promenade Deck and a smoke room at the aft end of the Upper Deck, with the most impressive feature being the elegant dome which capped the First Class dining room on the Saloon Deck.[7] The First Class Dining Room boasted both a piano and an organ. There were berths for valets and ladies' maids in close proximity to the first class accommodation.[8]
Similar to what was seen aboard Teutonic and Majestic, Second Class accommodations aboard were of more modest elegance, but spacious and comfortable. A separate deckhouse at the aft end of the superstructure provided both open and closed promenade decks and housed a library and smoke room which were scaled-down versions of their First Class counterparts. The same scaling-down was seen with the Second Class dining room, which could seat 148, and the array of comfortable two-berth and four-berth cabins.
Third Class, as was customary on all White Star Line vessels on the North Atlantic, was strictly segregated at opposite ends of the vessel on the Upper, Saloon and Main decks. On the Upper Deck, entrances were located adjacent to the forward and aft well decks, where most of the lavatories were located. At the very aft end of the deck were the Third Class Smoke Room and General Room, as well as the galley. Single men were berthed in five compartments at the forward end of the vessel (two on the Saloon deck, three on the Main deck), each of which were laid out in a rather novel design of open berths. Because the berthing of Third Class was distributed at either end of the vessel, the forward compartments each had berths for roughly 100 men, whereas conventional open berth dormitories often berthed up to 300 passengers on other ships. This allowed for a more open layout which was far less crowded, complete with long tables and wooden benches where male passengers were served their meals.[9]
In the aft quarters of the ship for Third Class were accommodations for single women, married couples and families located in five compartments (parallel to the forward layout, with two on the Saloon deck and three on the Main deck). As was seen aboard Teutonic and Majestic, as well as the newly completed Cymric, there were a limited number of two-berth and four-berth cabins, these were strictly reserved for married couples and families with children. The smaller of the two Saloon deck compartments was designated for married couples. On the main deck, a section of another compartment was designated for families with children. Each of the two compartments also had small dining rooms fashioned with fitted tables and swivel chairs similar to that in Second Class. In the remaining three compartments, single women were berthed in 20-berth dormitory-style cabins situated on the outer sides of each compartment. At the centre of each compartment, a widened corridor was fashioned as a dining room with long fitted tables and swivel chairs running lengthwise through each compartment.[10][11]
Proposed sister ship Olympic
As White Star typically ordered ships in pairs, a sister ship for Oceanic to be named Olympic was proposed. However, following the death of the company chairman Thomas Ismay in November 1899, the order was postponed and then cancelled. Instead the company decided to deploy the resources to produce a set of larger liners which would become the "Big Four" class. The name Olympic was later bestowed upon the RMS Olympic of 1910.[4][2]
