Albert Ballin was a German shipping magnate, who was the general director of the Hamburg-Amerikanische Packetfahrt-Actien-Gesellschaft (HAPAG) or Hamburg-America Line, at times the world’s largest shipping company. Being the inventor of the concept of the cruise ship, he is known as the father of modern cruise ship travel. The SS Auguste Viktoria, named after the German Empress Augusta Victoria of Schleswig-Holstein, was the first modern cruise ship in the world. She sailed on May 10, 1889 from Hamburg to New York City via Southampton. Two years later, she went on the world’s first Mediterranean cruise. In 1901, Ballin built the Emigration Halls on the Hamburg island of Veddel to accommodate the many thousands of people from all over Europe who arrived at the Port of Hamburg every week to emigrate to North and South America on his company’s ships. The island is now the BallinStadt Museum. read more…
