In the mid-1970s, three women in their twenties decided to treat themselves to a Mediterranean cruise ship holiday. They sailed with the Fred Olsen Lines ‘Winter Cruise Club’ aboard the M. S. Blenheim, which began its service in 1970, and weighed 10,427 tons. These souvenir photos were taken by a professional photographer working for ‘Onboard Services’. How long this cruise was and exactly where they sailed to is unclear, but they certainly docked for a while in Madeira. Every activity they ventured into seems to have been punctuated by a drinks party.
Cruise lining, always associated with luxury, can be traced back to the beginning of the 19th century, and the first purpose-built pleasure cruisers began production in 1900 – the first swimming pool was installed on a liner in 1907. The 1950s saw the introduction of lavish entertainments and star turns. Cruiser liners now also boast surf simulators, planetariums and racetracks. Fred Olsen Lines was founded in Norway in 1889 and is still running today. The television series Love Boat, which ran for nine years from 1977 to 1986, helped to popularize the concept of the cruise liner as an opportunity for romance.
Something that one cannot tell from these photos, but which I was able to easily tell by looking at the collection they come from, is that the woman with the dark perm’ and the woman with the blond ‘flick’ haircut were lovers.
THE FAMILY MUSEUM 