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Holland America Line


Fact file

This fact file is a snapshot of the company between 1930 and 1945.

Owners / Company name

Nederlandsch-Amerikaansche Stoomvaart Maatchappij [Netherlands-America Steamship Company (NASM)]

Company flag

Company flagGreen, white and green divided horizontally with letters N A S M in the centre.

[definition of flag terms

Major routes

Rotterdam - Southampton - New York

Rotterdam - London - Panama - west coast of USA

New York - Dutch East Indies

Ship colours

Company ship

Black hull. Buff coloured funnels with green, white and green bands.

Timeline

1871Nederlandsch-Amerikaansche Stoomvaart Maatschappij Company is founded as Plate, Reuchlin and Company in Rotterdam
1873The Holland-America Line is formed
1895Holland-America offers its first cruise service
1899The company starts a cargo service from Amsterdam to Newport News (USA), introducing the first of NASM`s fleet of cargo liners with names ending in `dyk`
1935Red Star Line - competitors in the Europe-New York service - collapses. Holland-America buys their ships Pennland and Westernland with the right to operate between Antwerp and New York under the name `Red Star Line`.
1945At the end of the Second World War only nine of the company`s twenty-five ships remained in their service
1957The company`s new liner Statendam is the first major vessel not to be named at her launching ceremony. She was built in a graving dock instead of on a slipway and was named after trials in the North Sea, seven months after she entered the water
1958After the war, traffic requirements and ship design change and a new vessel, Rotterdam was built to modern designes - she had no funnel.
1971The company stops running transatlantic passenger services and concentrates on cruises

Website

www.hollandamerica.com