My junior high (now called middle school) interest in ships.

There is recent news about the rusty SS United States luxury liner. It has been sitting at a pier in Philadelphia awaiting some new use. It's finally being towed to Alabama for cleaning and then to Florida to be sunk and turned into an artificial reef and tourist attraction for scuba divers.

During my childhood, I developed a big interest in the luxury liners. I also have an interest in large buildings.

Before air travel was so common across the Atlantic, there were the giant ships; like floating hotels. They made me think of floating cities, all in one building. There were Queen Mary and Queen Elizabeth, from UK, The SS United States, The SS France, Norway and so forth.

The largest one, back then, was the Queen Elizabeth. It was based in UK and did the trip from UK to New York. On board were staterooms, restaurants, I think maybe even a swimming pool. It was later brought out of service and they tried to turn it into a floating university. It would have had dorms, classrooms and so forth for visiting various ports of call around the world. Unfortunately it caught on fire during remodeling in Hong Kong harbor during my high school days. It ended up as scrap metal.
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Some of my interest in the ships might have been related to news about the Queen Mary which was brought out of commission, during my middle school years. It was turned into a hotel / museum at Long Beach, CA. I went onboard the Queen Mary, in 2003 during a bicycle trip down the coast. (More below).

During my middle school years, I also remember seeing a movie on television called "A Night To Remember." It was about the sinking of the Titanic. Not being much into movies, I do still remember just about every film I've seen in my lifetime of not many movies. That movie was in black and white; a dark scene indeed.

My interest in ships is related to my interest in buildings, campuses and cities. Places that have lots of variety under one roof, so to speak.