American-Hawaiian Steamship Co. ship 'Alaskan', circa 1907

Produced to promote the Tehuantepec Route service between New York, San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Puget Sound and Hawaii.

This lithograph was by Fred Pansing, a German-American maritime artist who specialized in oil paintings and lithographs of ocean liners, with regular commissions from Cunard and White Star Lines.

The Alaskan was built in 1902 at San Francisco, California, by the Union Iron Works as a commercial cargo ship for the American-Hawaiian Steamship Company, which employed her on the New York City-to-San Francisco-to-Honolulu, Hawaii, trade.  More info

The American-Hawaiian Steamship Company was founded in 1899 to carry sugar from Hawaii to the US mainland and manufactured goods back to Hawaii. At the time of the company's founding, its steamships sailed around South America via the Straits of Magellan to reach the East Coast ports. By 1907, the company began using the Isthmus of Tehuantepec route, shipments on which would arrive at Mexican ports - Salina Cruz, Oaxaca, for eastbound cargo, and Coatzacoalcos, Veracruz for westbound cargo - and would traverse the Isthmus of Tehuantepec on the Tehuantepec National Railway. When American political troubles with Mexico closed that route, American-Hawaiian returned to the Straits of Magellan route.