Book Review: Into the Ice by Mark Synnott
On May 19, 1845, two Royal Navy ships—HMS Erebus and HMS Terror—left Greenhithe, England under the command of veteran explorer Sir John Franklin. He and the men under his command sought the fabled Northwest Passage, a sea route connecting the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans via the Arctic. Franklin’s ships were last seen at Greenland’s Baffin…
Tall Ship Cuauhtémoc Hits the Brooklyn Bridge
Last night, May 17, 2025, tragedy struck when the Mexican Navy tall ship Cuauhtémoc hit New York’s Brooklyn Bridge just before 8:30 pm. Onlookers captured shocking video of the incident as it unfolded before them. All three masts snapped upon hitting the bridge span, leaving crew members dangling high in the rigging. Mexican Navy officials…
Book Review: Phantom Fleet by Alexander Rose
Deep inside the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, Illinois is something rather unexpected: a World War II German U-boat. Thousands of people visit U-505’s cold, claustrophobic interiors annually and step back into the past when it and other submarines like it terrifyingly hunted the world’s oceans. The story of how U-505, built…
For the Love of Ships
Today’s post is going to be a bit different, and I hope it doesn’t come across as too ranty. But it’s been on my mind a lot lately and I wanted to address it. On May 2, I made a post on my social media pages for the anniversary of QE2’s 1969 maiden voyage. I…
Book Review: Inside the Britannic by Simon Mills
Britannic—Titanic’s little sister. The third Olympic-class liner, she suffered the same fate as her older sibling and sank near the Greek island of Kea on November 21, 1916. There was a (highly fictionalized) TV movie in 2000, but Britannic has still been largely overshadowed by Titanic in popular culture. But ship nerds (I use that…
Poem: An Elegy for Lucy on the 110th Anniversary
On the 110th anniversary of the Lusitania’s sinking, I wrote an elegy for the ship and those who died in the disaster.
The Captain’s Table
Stories from the Golden Age of Ocean Liners to the Cruise Ships of Today
How it all started…
Over a decade ago, I started a blog called The Captain’s Table to tell the stories about the ships and people involved in the Golden Age of ocean liners. I was working as a tour guide aboard the Queen Mary in Long Beach, CA at the time and it was a way to help me both deepen my knowledge and explore a topic I’d been passionate about for a long time.
With this overhauled version of the blog, I’ll continue to explore the stories, ships, and people connected to the old ocean liners. But there’ll also be a new emphasis on cruise ships as well: they continue the traditions and history made famous by such ships as Queen Mary, United States, Mauretania, Caronia, and many others. I’ll be nerding out a lot, and I really hope that you enjoy this blog.
Zach Whitlow
Writer, Ship Geek, and Avid Cruiser