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We occasionally see social media repeat the strange tale of the SS Warrimoo. As told, the ship just happened to be in the right place at the right time so it positioned itself at the intersection of the equator and the international date line precisely at midnight, December 31, 1899. Consequently, the ship was simultaneously in two days, two months, two seasons, two years, two decades, and two centuries.
We love this type of tale. It is interesting and brief, thus allowing us to crank out the article and move on to other hobbies such as the day job that actually provides a salary.
Alas, as is the case with so many of these quick and easy tales, they become anything but quick and easy. The story is legitimately interesting, however. Journey with us as we unravel the facts from the fiction as we travel through time with the SS Warrimoo and figure out how much of the legend really holds water.
The SS Warrimoo and its Journey Across Time Zones
The SS Warrimoo was a passenger and refrigerated cargo ship that was launched in 1892. The next year, it became part of the liner service between Vancouver, British Columbia and Australia. Passengers on these trips were able to enjoy the experience of crossing the international date line and marvel at the closest thing to time travel that most of us will ever experience.
One of the Warrimoo’s most famous passengers was the celebrated author Mark Twain. The occasion for his 1895 voyage aboard the ship was not one that he relished. Twain may have been a world-class author and humorist, but he was a lousy judge of good investments. A few years earlier, he sank $300,000 (the equivalent of about $9 million in 2024) into the Paige Compositor, a mechanical typesetter that promised to revolutionize the printing industry. It was a complete disaster, and Twain lost everything he had invested. To pay off his creditors, Twain set off on a year-long round-the-world lecture tour which, in turn, inspired his 1897 travelogue Following the Equator. (Read it here through Project Gutenberg.)
It was during this journey that Twain experienced firsthand what it was like to cross the international date line and the equator, although not at the same time as would later be the claim that led us down this rabbit trail in the first place. Twain recounted the equator crossing in a way that only he could:
“A sailor explained to a young girl that the ship’s speed is poor because we are climbing up the bulge toward the center of the globe; but that when we should once get over, at the equator, and start downhill, we should fly.”
Later, as they approached the equator, he wrote:
“Afternoon.
Crossed the equator.
In the distance, it looked like a blue ribbon stretched across the ocean.
Several passengers kodak’d [took pictures with their portable cameras] it.”
A few days later, as the ship approached the international date line, he recorded that experience:
“While we were crossing the 180th meridian it was Sunday in the stern of the ship where my family were, and Tuesday in the bow where I was. They were there eating the half of a fresh apple on the 8th, and I was at the same time eating the other half of it on the 10th—and I could notice how stale it was, already.”
“The family were the same age that they were when I had left them five minutes before, but I was a day older now than I was then. The day they were living in stretched behind them halfway round the globe, across the Pacific Ocean and America and Europe; the day I was living in stretched in front of me around the other half to meet it.”
“Along about the moment that we were crossing the Great Meridian a child was born in the steerage, and now there is no way to tell which day it was born on. The nurse thinks it was Sunday, the surgeon thinks it was Tuesday. The child will never know its own birthday. It will always be choosing first one and then the other, and will never be able to make up its mind permanently. This will breed vacillation and uncertainty in its opinions about religion, and politics, and business, and sweethearts, and everything, and will undermine its principles, and rot them away, and make the poor thing characterless, and its success in life impossible.”
Unfortunately, Twain did not take his voyage aboard Warrimoo a few years later. It would have been delightful to have his eyewitness account of the event that has become steeped in legend and controversy.
The Legend Unveiled
According to The Ottawa Journal, Captain John Duthie Sydney Phillips took advantage of a fortuitous set of circumstances to accomplish a once-in-a-century achievement. On the evening of December 30, 1899, Warrimoo was once more making the crossing from Vancouver to Sydney. Captain Phillips happened to notice the ship was just a short distance from the intersection of the equator and the international date line.
Realizing he would not live to see this opportunity again, Phillips ordered his crew to bring the ship to the intersection. Using the sun by day and the stars by night, they verified their location. There, the ship remained in position until the stroke of midnight.
For a brief moment, the front of the ship would have been in the Southern Hemisphere, where it was summer, experiencing the summer of January 1, 1900. Meanwhile, the back of the ship was in the Northern Hemisphere, where it was the winter of December 31, 1899.
In other words, at that moment, Warrimoo was:
- in two different days (on its forward half, it was already Monday, while on its aft part, it was still Sunday);
- in two different months (forward in January, aft in December);
- in two different seasons (summer and winter);
- in two different years (1900 and 1899);
- in two different centuries (the 20th and the 19th). Yes, we know the 20th century officially started on January 1, 1901, but let’s not split hairs right now; and
- in all four hemispheres at once (the southern and the northern on either side of the equator, and the eastern and western on either side of the 180th meridian).
But Did It Happen?
It’s a great story, but did it really happen?
We can be pretty certain that Warrimoo made the journey at that time. A brief account in the Sydney Morning Herald on January 10, 1900, reported the ship (incorrectly identified as RMS Warrimoo instead of SS Warrimoo) departing Vancouver on December 15, 1899, and arriving in Sydney on January 9, 1900. The article made no mention, however, of the momentous events of New Year’s Eve.
The first account of that aspect of Warrimoo’s voyage appeared in the Ottawa Journal article referenced above. That was in 1942. It said that Captain Phillips, by then retired, was alive and able to verify the story from his logbooks. The story was picked up and gained further popularity with an article Ships and the Sea in 1953. The legend continued to captivate audiences and found new life in online social media posts.
It would seem there would be at least some mention of such a significant event in the years between 1900 and 1942. The fact that we first heard about it nearly half a century later casts some doubt on the story’s veracity.
If the events unfolded as reported, it seems improbable that Warrimoo could have reached such a specific location in the middle of the ocean. During the early 20th century, navigational technology was not sufficiently advanced to pinpoint a ship’s position with such remarkable precision. Furthermore, the intersection of the international date line and the equator represents a remote and predominantly unremarkable point in the Pacific Ocean, further complicating precise navigation.
Given these limitations, it’s highly unlikely that the SS Warrimoo ever achieved the incredible feat attributed to her. While it’s possible that the ship was in the general vicinity of the equator and the international date line around the end of 1899, the precise alignment described in the legend is beyond the capabilities of the navigational tools of the time. If they had gone to the trouble of seeking the precise location, it seems likely that one or more of the passengers and crew would have brought it to the public’s attention shortly after arriving at their destination.
Conclusion: Dubious
The tale of the SS Warrimoo is a wonderful piece of maritime folklore. It is a story that captures the imagination and invites us to ponder the mysteries of the sea. It helps us contemplate the possibilities, explore the limits of maritime navigation, and learn a bit about geography. In terms of verifiable history, however, we’re inclined to designate this as one big fish story.
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Categories: Accomplishments and Records, Debunked Legends, History, Holidays, Transportation