RMS Oceanic

In the late 1890s the White Star Line's existing flagship ocean liners and both launched in 1889, had become outmoded due to rapid advances in marine technology: Their competitors, the Cunard Line, had introduced the and in 1893, and from 1897 the German Norddeutscher Lloyd began introducing four new s beginning with . In order to compete with these ships the White Star Line needed to produce a new flagship which could rival them.

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 of 1870, and was to be the first ship to exceed Brunel's 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…