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Before the sinking of the Lusitania and the advent of WWI, steamships crammed with immigrants carried their wealthy passengers in luxury.

After WWI and before the sinking of the Normandie, the Leviathan, Mauretania, Queen Mary and other magnificent ships sailed the ocean.

This episode opens with the QEII leaving New York on her 999th voyage. The close of WWI saw many of the great liners lost as casualties, such as the Lusitania and the Britannic. With blame for the war laid at Germany's feet, her fleet was seized as reparations for the victors. The peacetime also saw an end to immigration with newly enacted quotas in the United States, forcing ship owners to woo the new rising middle class with cheaper fares and modified accommodations (formerly 3rd class, now "Tourist" class). Yet, even with the advent of the Great Depression, some of the most beloved liners of the Art Deco and Modern Age came into existence, like the Normandie and the Queen Mary.

This episode opens with the QEII in the mid-ocean east bound from New York to her home port of Southampton. In the 1920s and 30s the Atlantic greyhounds returned to the ocean, as glorious hotels and ships of state. And when a new war presents greater and more difficult problems on the Atlantic battlefield, it will inspire the great ships to serve their finest hour - some will become legends in their time. This then is the continuing story of the great floating palaces of the North Atlantic.