The steamship business was as tradition-bound as any in the country. Many of its most prominent executives were men who reveled in the romance of sea and salt air. They worked within a few blocks of one another in lower Manhattan, and spent well-oiled luncheons comparing notes with their peers at haunts like India House and the Whitehall Club. For all of their earthy bluster, their businesses had survived thanks almost entirely to government coddling.
