Ballin was the youngest of seven children born to Danish-Jewish parents in Hamburg, Germany in 1857. He quickly rose to become the managing director of the giant German shipping company "Hamburg-American Line" in 1899. [This shipping company was merged in 1970 with its rival the North German Lloyd (in German: Norddeutscher Lloyd) to form Hapag-Lloyd and still exists today.] He revolutionized travel on the high seas and set the standard for the design and construction of ocean-going passenger ships. Ballin's greatest triumphs were the three epic luxury liners: Imperator (1913), Vaterland (1914) and the Bismarck (launched in 1914 but completed for the British as Majestic in 1922). These giant ships were the largest most luxurious passenger vessels ever built up to that time.
Deeply depressed over the war and the state of his company, Albert Ballin committed suicide on November 9, 1918 by taking an overdose of sleeping tablets.
Ballin was the youngest of seven children born to Danish-Jewish parents in Hamburg, Germany in 1857. He quickly rose to become the managing director of the giant German shipping company "Hamburg-American Line" in 1899. [This shipping company was merged in 1970 with its rival the North German Lloyd (in German: Norddeutscher Lloyd) to form Hapag-Lloyd and still exists today.] He revolutionized travel on the high seas and set the standard for the design and construction of ocean-going passenger ships. Ballin's greatest triumphs were the three epic luxury liners: Imperator (1913), Vaterland (1914) and the Bismarck (launched in 1914 but completed for the British as Majestic in 1922). These giant ships were the largest most luxurious passenger vessels ever built up to that time.
Deeply depressed over the war and the state of his company, Albert Ballin committed suicide on November 9, 1918 by taking an overdose of sleeping tablets.
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