M/S "MONTEREY", MSC - Mediterranean Shipping Cruises. Postcard

M/S MONTEREY
MSC - Mediterranean Shipping Cruises

Advertising postcard.

The Monterey was built by Bethlehem Steel of Quincy, Massachusetts, in 1952 as the Free State Mariner "Mariner"-class cargo ship and completely rebuilt at Willamette Steel in Portland, Oregon, in 1956 as the 365-passenger luxury liner for the Matson Line service in the South Seas. After successive sales, in 1994 she passed into the hands of the Italian shipping company Flotta Lauro, which became Mediterranean Shipping Cruises. In 2006, renamed Monte, she was transferred to Alang (India) for scrapping.

MSC was founded in Naples in 1970 by Gianluigi Aponte and began operations with two ships, which covered an operational merchant line between the Mediterranean and Somalia. The company expanded through the acquisition of second-hand cargo ships. By 1977, the company was operating in northern Europe, Africa, and the Indian Ocean. Business expansion continued through the 1980s; by the end of the decade, MSC was operating shipping lines to North America and Australia. In 1989, MSC acquired the cruise operator Lauro Lines, which was renamed MSC Cruises in 1995. It is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland.

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