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Edition: 10

The Log of the Empire State by Geneve L. A. Shaffer

Dedicated to My Mother and Your Mother

To My Mother

Your little hands are folded, Your tired breast is still. But your valiant heart beats on and on, And so forever will. In the lives of those who knew you, Each gentle beat will bring An echo sweet and tender, To linger there and sing.

The Log of the Empire State

Introduction

As Miss Shaffer was appointed the special representative of the San Francisco Examiner on the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce, Commercial Relationship Tour of the Orient, as well as being a member of the San Francisco Chamber of Commerce, she was requested to write this little book covering the three months' trip, and she wishes to thank all the members of the party for their kindly interest and cooperation in helping her secure much of the information contained herein.

Before we had reached the Golden Gate we acted like some great happy family, eager to enjoy every minute. After we stopped waving our tired arms to the crowds of friends on the docks and the last bouquet aimed at the Mayor's tug had landed in the bay, small groups, with radiant faces, discussed what do you suppose? No, not the crossing of the Bar, but the opening of the ship's bar. As you know, Uncle Sam seems to consider the dry law impossible on the water.

We were all saying that San Francisco's farewell made us proud to belong to such a city, when M. A. Gale told us that he wanted to add a word of praise for one of San Francisco's traffic officers, who let him by when he made a speedy trip for some valuables left behind, which had just been missed at the last moment. But, do you remember who was the last passenger? She was nervous and fidgety ever since she came on board, too. None other than Bulah, the handsome mare bound for Yokohama. It was worth going through the steerage to watch her enjoy one of our "eleven o'clock" apples.

When the lunch gong sounded, we all went below to try and get settled in our home for the next three months. Apparently there was no place left for even our hats, thoughtful gifts, fruits, candy and flowers, filled every inch of ordinary space. Christmas time was tame by comparison.

Many were down to lunch, fortified by a highball, but at dinner, mal de mer had claimed its victims, and there were only a few brave spirits on deck to indulge in dancing the first night.

While most of us were getting comfortably settled in our deck chairs, someone noticed that Louis Glass, George Vranizan, C. W. Hinchcliffe, Carl Westerfeld, C. A. Thayer, C. H. James, William Symon, F. S. Ballinger, P. H. Lyon, S. L. Schwartz and Henry Mattlage had disappeared below. And it is said by one who trailed them to their lair, that the Fantan and Pie-gow games, going on in the steerage, were the magnet.

There were other discoveries in the steerage. A Servian girl, Alma Karlin, who speaks ten languages fluently, but could not afford a first-class passage on account of the low exchange value of her country's money. She is on a three-year tour to study conditions in the Pacific Islands, to learn if her countrymen can successfully immigrate to this region.

A young American married to a Chinaman, a group of Orientals devouring an odd-looking concoction with chop sticks, a motley group of Hindus with their fezzes, made the picturesque gathering, that gladly received the surplus fruits distributed by the belles of the ship.

We struck a squall that surprised many of us enjoying the salt sea breeze in our stuffy state rooms, by washing the spray over our neatly put-out dinner clothes. That night it took real sea legs to dance while the ship rocked. But it was great sport, and Sidney Kahn's University Orchestra "jazzed" on as if they were on solid ground.

The third day all of the officers appeared in white. White duck curtains replaced the wooden doors. The women blossomed out in the daintiest of summer frocks, the men in white flannels, and although most of us found our shoes difficult to put on deck games were in full swing and sea sickness was a thing of the past.

Commissioner Krull was the first to jump into the open-air swimming tank, some of the ladies following. But it took deck tennis and the tropics to make the tank popular.

The stoves burn oil, and although the day was hot, and the noon meal was in preparation, there was no excessive heat and no fumes. The white-clad Chinese waiters did their appointed tasks with the smoothness and lack of confusion of clockwork.

Our smiling waiters greeted us every morning in long blue kimonos. Ours answered to the name of Arling, and after one had ordered an abnormal breakfast, he suggested that the griddle cakes were "veery goo-wd." Everyone ate more than they ever thought they could, and when at eleven o'clock, the deck boy came along with broth, few there were that had the courage to say, "No." The tang of the sea caused groups to invade the charming tea-room, with its yellow curtains and painted wicker furniture, at tiffin time. And if chicken, a-la-King, was served after the nightly dancing party, - well, everyone said, "We don't make a trip like this every day, so, why not?"

There was a weighing machine on the lower deck, but, we all believed that it must have been out of order. If we had not gained any more pounds than we had spent for oriental souvenirs, we would have been lucky.

Some of the older members of the party welcomed the Sunday evening movies instead of the strenuous dancing, but we were all glad to go to bed after the movie villain had been killed.

The servants were so attentive and the beds so soft that many of the ladies fell into the custom of having breakfast in the staterooms.

After lunch one sunny day we mounted the steep little stairs to the captain's quarters. His spacious combination living and bedroom with private bath was a miracle to those of us who had to have the room boy move the luggage in order to have space enough to open the quaint little bureau drawers. On his center table was one of those strange dwarf Japanese trees, that are not permitted to be imported. These odd plants seem to thrive in spite of their diet of whiskey and the binding of their branches with tiny wires - perhaps, if they must be fed exclusively on whiskey, there is another reason besides the possibility of their bringing into our country a foreign insect that excludes them.

We were told that the captain's and officers' quarters were certified and not counted when the capacity of the ship was figured, so the ship seemed bigger than ever to us. Next we invaded the chart room, saw the device that tells the whereabouts of a coming typhoon, listened to the telephonic arrangement that proclaims the proximity of the buoy bells, watched the little indicator that makes a red line depicting the exact course of the ship on a circular chart, tried out the fire alarm system that instantly rings a bell if a high temperature is registered any place on the ship, from the bridal suite to the darkest corner of the hold. We set the fog whistle to blow at regular intervals. We were told that the searchlight could enable the pilot to discover objects about five miles out, and by the time the gyro compass and numerous other devices had been explained to us, we were ready to believe that the ship cost seven million dollars, and that five thousand dollars was the daily operating expense .

The mock trial was one of the features of the trip. Nearly everyone was arrested, sentenced or fined. Mrs. F. Panter's and Captain Ruben Robinson's trials were the most sensational. In spite of Carl Westerfeld's efforts to save Captain Robinson from being convicted of fox trotting with a certain charming widow, he was heavily sentenced. Louis C. Brown was released upon the hearing of the eloquent pleadings of his attorney, Louis H. Mooser. At the close of the session, Commissioner Francis Krull imposed a fine upon himself for his merciful tendencies as the judge.

When a crowd of us piled into the wireless room and asked the whys and wherefores, the poor operator gave up trying to explain why the messages were all sent at night, and settled the matter by telling us that the atmospheric conditions were better then, and that the ship was equipped with two systems, the spark and the arc, but that the arc was given the preference. The Empire State kept its apparatus tuned to the one at Sloat Boulevard, so if any of those at home missed us, just all they had to do was to drive past that station any night, and, perhaps, at that very moment, a message was being received from us.

No alarm clock that was ever invented smote the ears with greater animosity than did the ship's gong at 6:30 the morning we arrived at Honolulu. If it had not been for the fact that the committee was there it would have taken even more than that disturber of the peace to arouse us, for sleep seemed the most desired thing after the Chinese dinner dance that had lasted until the wee hours.

We were all at the luncheon given to us by the Honolulu Commercial Club. Faxton Bishop told us of the seriousness of the labor situation and asked our aid. We all remember how eloquently our much lamented spokesman, A. F. Morrison, answered the address and said that California's prosperity depended in many ways upon Hawaiian prosperity and their problems were our problems.

Wallace R. Farrington, Governor of the Territory of Hawaii, said that the labor situation must be solved to insure the prosperity of the islands.

We were next whizzed to the Outrigger Club, and if everyone had seen how hard Warren Shannon paddled to reach the crest of a wave before it broke, they would all be convinced that he was the hardest working supervisor we have.

John H. Wilson, the mayor of Honolulu, motored our party around the island and gave us a luncheon at a hotel near one of the beaches. We will remember this day as one of our happiest.

The first day out of Honolulu we were all discussing our impressions. Most of us had passed the Honolulu schools at recess time and had noted only one or two white-skinned children. It was, as Dr. A. W. Morton expressed it, "Looks like a little Japan." Of course, everyone knows of the vividness and great variety of the coloring of the foliage in sharp contrast to the brilliant pink soil, but we could not stop talking about it. Some of us noted the beauty of a little plant, which at home we carefully water and cherish in some tiny pot, only to learn that on the Island it grows in such abundance that it is considered nearly as great a pest as the Mediterranean fly - so it would seem that beauty in the vegetable kingdom does not always mean desirability, any more than it does in the human family.

Many of us had been taken over the sugar-cane plantations, seen the young plants pushing through the paper , gone through the refineries, seeing the cane stalks ground in the huge rollers and had been allowed to taste the sickeningly sweet molasses. Along the roads were Hawaiian huts with octopi drying on the porches, beside the reclining figures of the strong providers of the family, resting up, no doubt, from the task of catching and killing the octopi by hitting the squid's heads.

Some of the party waxed eloquent about the wonderful leprosy cures, recently accomplished in the Islands, through the discoveries of the chemist Dr. Dean, who took the chalmoogra oil used in India over a thousand years ago as a cure and made it possible to take.

Some of us stopped to investigate the powerful wireless station with the instruments capable of receiving messages at a distance of 5000 miles. Still others told of the island at the Pearl Harbor Naval station being purchased for ten thousand dollars and then being sold to our government for 400,000 dollars.

Many had not only received the leis, but a new native name as well, for, as you know, it is the Hawaiian way of labeling everyone with some name that to the Islander expresses their predominant characteristic.

We were gazing at the magnificent sunset, when someone who seemed to have inside information, repeated the old adage, "A red sky at night is the sailor's delight, but if followed by a red sky in the morning, it's the sailor's warning." We had all found the tranquil waters of the Pacific so refreshing after the rush and excitement of Honolulu sightseeing, and did not know that the worst storm the Empire State had experienced was before us.

Most of us rolled out of bed the next morning, and the only reason some of us did not fall to the floor was because the bureaus stopped us half way, with many a resounding thud. Many of the party did not attempt to get up or out of the staterooms. Will we ever forget the dining tables equipped with metal railings, divided into sections to hold in the dishes? Even then, the eggs and cream rolled over the cloth or into our unreceptive laps, and the way the waiters moistened the cloth in the spots where they set the water glasses in an attempt to make them stay put. But they would not any more than our tummies would "stay put."

We then appreciated the necessity of the railings all over the ship, especially when we commenced to hit each side of the passage way in trying to step forward. Edward C. Wagner was jestingly remarking to Louis Glass that if he should fall, there would be broken "Glass." It was but a short while afterward when an unexpected lurch of the ship threw him to the deck, breaking his glasses.

We all remember that the deck chairs had an unpleasant way of sliding until they hit the opposite wall, bouncing out the sea-sick occupants. Even in getting out of the chairs many of us fell. The upper deck looked like the ward of an emergency hospital. Mrs. A. F. Morrison had fallen, breaking a bone in her wrist, Mrs. E. Dinkelspiel had her head injured, Louis Glass had a bandage over his cut face, and scarcely anyone escaped without black and blue marks.

To see one of our capitalists being led weakly by a strong attendant, while grasping his mal de mer tin firmly, was a sight unnoticed, in the tumult of rushing waves. Of course, all portholes were closed, two of the crew narrowly escaped being washed overboard. Their spotless uniform of white had long since been discarded for rain coats and high boots. Some of us slept out on deck rather than negotiate the treacherous stairs to the uncertain joys of a stateroom in which the trunks had to be lashed to the walls to avoid painful contact . In most cases the dainty bureau scarfs upon which reposed the Cologne bottle, mirror, powder, hairpins, etc., etc., had dashed into one conglomerate, broken mass on the floor.

M. A. Gale and Warren Shannon were seen in dejected heaps, with only half-closed eyes visible above the steamer robes.

Mrs. Carrie Schwabacher gathered about the piano those well enough to be about , playing old-fashioned songs, to try to raise the drooping spirits.

Chanticleer never greeted the morning with gayer spirits than this party, when we saw the clouds had rolled away, and when someone repeated, "On the road to Mandilay, where the flying fishes play" , all the old familiar quotations took on a new significance of realty.

Many of us felt a great curiosity to see the engine that had pushed us through the storm, so we descended countless iron stairs, down to the very bottom of the ship; above us towered a bewildering assortment of ladders, levers, pipes and valves. The heat was over-powering, so we rushed to the ventilator and cooled off quickly. The deafening noise prevented us from hearing all the engineer's explanations. Next we were taken singly through the two massive doors separating the boilers from the rest of the ship. In case of an accident all the doors of the ship, including these, could be automatically closed from the deck, dividing the ship into three compartments.

We saw how the thirty-seven cakes of ice, consumed daily, were made, inspected the laundry and peeked in where the precious, rapidly diminishing liquors were stored, and we all felt satisfied that we knew "What made the wheels go around."

With the regular meetings of the Executive committee, with Herbert Hoover's Trade Investigation committee , mingling with the party to assist in establishing friendly commercial relationship; with all those identified with certain businesses and professions divided into groups, and even with the women organized, we felt ready to meet any Oriental dignitaries, or delegations.

We remember well how often Warren Shannon, with his unfailing humor, sent us into gales of laughter, auctioning off the numbers that represented the possible run of the ship on the following day. Louis Mooser bid the first one hundred dollars on the number that won the pool. C. H. Matlage, William Muir, F. H. Speich, Louis Brown, Mrs. S. Schwartz and Mrs. Carrie Schwabacher were also heavy bidders.

Of course, Mrs. A. Gee, Mrs. A. B. Luther, Mrs. Washburn, Mrs. Wheeler, Mrs. Boole, Mrs. Wood, Mrs. Shannon and Mrs. Grady looked charming, as usual. The Misses Bridge, Miss Kinslow, Miss Neff and Miss Bell also looked attractive. Dr. Gates, Dr. Judell, Miss Simon, Mrs. Rothenberg, Mrs. Denson, Mrs. Dunn, Mrs. Yates, the Misses Hunter, Mrs. Barnard, Miss James, Mrs. Ross, A. W. Morton, Jr., and Mrs. Krull went to such a lot of trouble to get up their interesting costumes. Henry S. Bridge had, "a fine make-up" and looked like a real Southern Negro. Pretty Miss Howlett and Miss Wood always made one think of the posters of "Sweet Sixteen."

Warren Shannon's Entertainment committee, assisted by Miss Moore, Miss Craig, Mrs. Bercovich and Mrs. Panter, certainly discovered the talent on board and we will always be grateful for the sweet singing of charming Mrs. Gale, Mrs. Brown, Mrs. Schwartz and Miss Reed and the playing of Miss Moore, Mrs. Alexander and of our talented "Mary."

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