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S.S. JOHN D. ARCHBOLD (1)
From a Newport News Shipbuilding publication
S.S. JOHN D. ARCHBOLD (1)
Hull No: 170
Owner Standard Oil C&
Launched: January 28.1914
Delivered: March 17,1914
Dimensions: 474.5 x 60 x 36.17 ft.
Gross Tonnage: 8,374
Displacement: 16,670 tons
Machinery: Quadruple Expansion Engine. 3 Boilers
Horsepower/Speed: 2,800/10.5 knots
Fate War Loss, 1917
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JOHN D. ARCHBOLD was an important ship for Newport News not only because she was the largest tanker built there to her time, but especially since she was the first built for the shipyard's best commercial customer, the Standard Oil Co. Between 1914 and 1965, fully 41 tankers were delivered to this owner, and more than half of them were still in service into the 1980s.
JOHN D. ARCHBOLD and two sister ships built at the shipyard were large for their day and were built as coal burners. They had nine pairs of main cargo tanks and summer tanks and were provided with a pump room amidships.
The keel for JOHN D. ARCHBOLD was laid in June 1913, and the ship was launched by Mrs. Michael Murray Van Beunen, daughter of John D. Archbold, on January 28, 1914. After delivery on March 17.1914, the tanker look up routine service between Gulf ports and Standard Oil's refinery at Bayonne, NJ.
Her career on this route was routine, but it was not to be a long one. On June 16, 1917, she was torpedoed by a German submarine at 47°41 'N. 60°1 W, off the coast of Brittany and became one of the first American ships lost after the United States entered the war on April 6.1917.
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