AG and MM Board

Inside description of SS John Lykes

Posted by Heather Holter Ellis on June 24, 2009, 11:07 am

Thanks for all the previous information you all have provided! Now I am requesting information about the inside descriptions of the John Lykes - how many floors/decks, and the relative size of the cabins & toilet facilitities.
Thanks so much!
Heather Holter Ellis

Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes

Posted by Nate on September 23, 2020, 1:40 pm, in reply to "Inside description of SS John Lykes"

I would like to see the floors as well

Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes

Posted by Ron Carlson on June 25, 2009, 11:46 am, in reply to "Inside description of SS John Lykes"

Well, Heather,

Good thing you're not asking for too much!

As mentioned in earlier messages, SS JOHN LYKES was built as a C1-B design cargo ship. See http://drawings.usmaritimecommission.de/drawings_c1.htm for profile drawings of C1-B designs. Scroll down about half way; JOHN LYKES is mentioned by name as having been built by Federal Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company, Kearny, New Jersey, with a representative drawing of the five C1-B ships built by this company.

Also see http://drawings.usmaritimecommission.de/drawing/drawings_c1_b_des_fk.htm for a technical description of these ships.

A careful reading of the technical description and reviewing the drawing of the C1-B design leads me to believe the ship may have had the following decks. Those marked by an asterisk (*) below are my terminology; the names of the other decks come from the technical description. From highest level to lowest:

flying bridge *
bridge deck *
cabin deck
main deck
second deck
third deck
lower hold/tank top level *

The four upper decks can be seen in the profile drawings; the decks below the main deck are within the hull and are assumed, based on the technical description.

As for the size of the cabins and toilets (heads in sailor-speak), I haven't the foggiest idea, except probably small. The technical description mentions two owner's staterooms on the cabin deck which were likely larger than typical crew quarters.

In your experience the ship apparently carried a number of civilian passengers, the accommodations for which must have been in addition to standard crew quarters. Perhaps the second deck, one level below the main deck, was fitted out in some way for passengers, surely in less than luxurious style, but again I would have no idea. JOHN LYKES served as a troop ship so there must have been extensive reconfiguration of the below-deck area to house troops. Perhaps there was further reconfiguration to accommodate civilian passengers.

Caveat: since JOHN LYKES and similar ships have long since been scrapped, I have no first-hand knowledge of the layout of the ship and the above is speculative only.

There was another thread on the message board that also had to do with JOHN LYKES. A person named Nancy Ranella left a message to say that her grandfather had served in this ship and that she has many pictures. See http://members.boardhost.com/armedguard/msg/1232853847.html. You might want to get in touch with her. Her e-mail is sunnshiene@gmail.com.

Good luck.

Ron Carlson, Webmaster

Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes

Posted by Heather Holter Ellis on June 25, 2009, 1:17 pm, in reply to "Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes"

Well, Ron,
If you weren't so good at providing such wonderful, helpful information you wouldn't have the problem with pesky inquirers like me! I do sincerely appreciate all the wondeful info that you have given, and it just made me more curious about the whole ship. It looks so huge, can't quite fathom its size, then wondered about the # of decks, then figured that may be the wrong term, and that of course led to cabin size, and should have remembered "head"! And I will certainly follow up on the other lead of the person whose grandfather served on the SS John Lykes!
Thank you so very much!
Heather

Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes

Posted by Ron Carlson on June 25, 2009, 1:44 pm, in reply to "Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes"

Heather,

JOHN LYKES and her sisters were good-sized ships in their day but small in comparison with most modern merchant ships.

I don't know where you are located but if you are near or ever have a chance to travel to one of these locations, be sure to visit one of these World War II-era merchant ships to get a sense of size. They are all about the size of JOHN LYKES, in fact they are all a bit longer. All but RED OAK VICTORY are still operational.

SS JOHN W BROWN (on which I volunteer), Baltimore http://www.liberty-ship.com

SS AMERICAN VICTORY, Tampa http://www.americanvictory.org/

SS JEREMIAH O'BRIEN, San Francisco http://www.ssjeremiahobrien.com/

SS RED OAK VICTORY, Richmond, CA http://www.ssredoakvictory.com/index.htm

SS LANE VICTORY, San Pedro, CA http://www.lanevictory.org/

Ron

Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes

Posted by Heather Holter Ellis on June 25, 2009, 1:53 pm, in reply to "Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes"

Hi Ron,
Unfortunately I am so landlocked you wouldn't believe - North Dakota! But I have a daughter in NYC, and another daughter whose husband is in the AF and will be stationed at the Pentagon, so Baltimore wouldn't be too far away. Thanks for another tidbit of imformation! Baltimore is the city that several of my ancestors came to from Europe and left from to move farther west.

Heather

Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes

Posted by Roy Brown on June 26, 2009, 1:45 pm, in reply to "Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes"

My wife and I, and our son and his wife, had the great pleasure of visiting the SS John W. Brown in July 2001. (We live in Indiana).
Since I served aboard a Liberty ship exactly like the John Brown it "transported" me back to 1944 and I was in a "happy daze" mode during the entire day we spent aboard her!
If anyone has the opportunity to make such a visit they should do so. It was fascinating.
We sailed out into the Bay from Baltimore and were "attacked" by a Japanese torpedo bomber and a dive bomber. My son video-taped the actions and so my family was able to get some sense of what the Armed Guard sailors and Merchant Marine sailors faced during WWII. (Incidentally, the torpedo bomber came down and was "on the deck" as he made his run at us! He was no more than forty feet above the water as he came toward us. The passengers aboard gasped and I think they got a real "education" about the nature of an an air attack during World War II! (I HOPE they did)!
Roy Brown

Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes

Posted by Heather Holter Ellis on June 26, 2009, 4:04 pm, in reply to "Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes"

That sounds like a fantastic experience, and one which I, and I think my family would thouroughly enjoy! Will have to try to work on that trip as well.
I was wanting to write back to express my tremendous gratitude to all you service people, not only for serving so bravely & courageously in the war, but now spending huge amounts of time in volunteering and helping so many in finding the missing pieces of their families' puzzles and providing such a great service with all the information you provide!
I have been tracking down an uncle who died on Luzon in the battle of Lupao, I found out from the wonderful people at the Tropic Lightning Musuem, and that he had an Excellent rating on 3 weapons, and a Sharpshooter rating on 3 others. However they were not able to make out what those were from the only picture I had sent. But that is just another instance of the wonderful help that is provided by the service people. Still trying to find out from another website she gave me.
So thank you, thank all of you so very much!

Heather

Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes

Posted by Ron Carlson on June 26, 2009, 2:13 pm, in reply to "Re: Inside description of SS John Lykes"

Roy,

Thanks for your recollections and your selling job on behalf of Project Liberty Ship. We keep offering what we call Living History Cruises and people keep coming. We had our most recent cruise just two weeks ago.

Your reaction is so typical: the Armed Guard and merchant marine veterans come up the gangway and immediately they are 60 years younger, with a spring in their step and a glint in their eye. Transported, indeed. Or transformed.

If you can't come to Baltimore, you can have the same experience in San Francisco (SS JEREMIAH O'BRIEN), San Pedro, California (SS LANE VICTORY) or Tampa (SS AMERICAN VICTORY), all of which offer the same kind of cruise. See http://armed-guard.com/resources.html for links to the web site of each ship.

Ron Carlson, Webmaster

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