RMS Queen Elizabeth: The Beautiful Lady

Built at the end of the Depression and launched on the weekend of the Munich Crisis, the Queen Elizabeth’s maiden voyage was a wartime dash to New York to escape the Luftwaffe’s bombs. After a wartime career that saw her bring an American division to Gourock every few weeks, she finally entered company service for Cunard in 1946. She sailed with her sister Queen Mary through Cunard’s golden years and was sold out of service in 1968, becoming a tourist attraction in Port Everglades. Sold again, she became C. Y. Tung’s Seawise University and was burned out in 1972 while being converted, before being scrapped where she lay in Hong Kong harbour.