For over a decade during the “Roaring Twenties,” a great white ocean liner would sail from berth 156 in Los Angeles every Saturday. The pier was packed with waving and cheering people looking up at the happy passengers crowding the railings. The vessel’s band on deck played jazz tunes and popular favorites. The captain stood forward on the bridge wing watching the lowering of the gangway amid a hail of colored streamers and confetti. The liner’s whistle would blow at noon, raising the cheering to a higher pitch as the band played “Aloha Oe.” Slowly the great mass of the liner inched away from the dock.

These magnificent ocean liners provided not only a regular connection between the mainland and the islands, but were a high-profile means of proclaiming that Los Angeles was becoming a world class harbor, financial center and artistic metropolis. And the Los Angeles Steamship Company, “LASSCO,” became known across the country.

HOLLYWOOD TO HONOLULU,The Story of the Los Angeles Steamship Company

by Gordon Ghareeb and Martin Cox.

• 280 pages, 8½ x 11,
• ISBN 978-1-889901-44-2
• Price: $35

Western Pipe and Steel was one of many shipyards called upon to “build ships for victory” in the early days of World War II. But unlike other companies that were thrown together to meet the national emergency, Western Pipe and Steel had the experience and know-how to get the job done; the company had built ships during World War I. With seasoned yard workers, shipbuilding prowess and decades of steelworking success, it knew exactly how to put ships together.

Steel Ships and Iron Pipe is the story of one of San Francisco Bay’s pre-eminent shipyards, written in scholarly yet intriguing detail.

STEEL SHIPS AND IRON PIPE: Western Pipe and Steel Company of California — the Company, the Yard, the Ships

by Dean L. Mawdsley

• Hard cover, 224 pp., 150+ illus., biblio., index
• ISBN 1-889901-28-8
• Price: $29.95

During World War I, American shipping men and German diplomats came together in San Francisco to aid the German war effort by taking advantage of American neutrality laws.

THE SAN FRANCISCO SHIPPING CONSPIRACIES OF WORLD WAR ONE

by David H. Grover

• Soft cover, 180pp., photos.
• ISBN 0-9623935-3-3
• Price: $15.95