History Channel “Hero Ships” Film Debut Event Kicks Off "S.S. Jeremiah O'Brien" 65th Anniversary June 17, 2008

64 years ago, a hero fought at Normandy – the S.S. Jeremiah O’Brien. On June 17, she literally gets to toot her own horn by playing host to the premiere of the new History International Channel documentary, “Hero Ships: SS Jeremiah O’Brien.” The event, starting with a 5:30pm reception hosted by Brandy Ho’s Restaurant, will include tours of the WWII ship including her vintage engine room (featured in the film Titanic) and culminate with a screening of the film.

Tickets are $25 in advance, $30 at the door, and may be ordered by phoning (415) 544-0100 or online at www.ssjeremiahobrien.org. Seating is limited.

The screening will take place onboard the O’Brien, home to the National Liberty Ship Memorial at San Francisco’s Pier 45 in Fisherman’s Wharf. The ship will be moored at dockside for this event.

“Hero Ships” is a stirring and historic 13-part series about the most prestigious vessels in US Naval history. Presented in high-definition, with gripping interviews from the veterans who served on their decks, each Hero Ships episode shows the evolution of one ship and retraces the most dramatic moments from her history. After WWII, the ships were forgotten by their country and were destined for sale or destruction before veterans’ groups stepped in to save them.

Now, such hero ships as the O’Brien are moored in some of the nation’s biggest cities as floating museums and gateways to a time when gray-skinned battlewagons prowled our imaginations. During World War II, 2,751 Liberty Ships, constructed at 18 US ship yards, were meant to be built quicker than German U-Boats could sink them. “Built by the mile and chopped off by the yard,” as President Roosevelt said, they were to form a “bridge of ships” across the Atlantic. Winston Churchill wrote, “Without the supply column of Liberty Ships that endlessly plowed the seas between America and England, the war would have been lost.”

Of the 13 naval vessels featured in the Hero Ships series, the O’Brien is the world’s oldest, fully functional and most historically accurate World War II vessel still in Coast Guard-approved operation.

Tuesday, June 17, 5:30 reception followed by screening at 7:30
Pier 45
Tickets are $25 in advance, $30 at the door, and may be ordered by phoning (415) 544-0100 or online at www.ssjeremiahobrien.org.

Official Website: http://www.ssjeremiahobrien.org