Title: Mazie Krebs Info 1

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Fiddlinsue

Rank：none Score：220 Posts：220 From：USA Register：11/11/2008 8:17 AM

Date Posted：01/23/2009 4:55 AMCopy HTML   MAZIE KREBS   THE LADY WHO DESIGNED THE ADMIRAL   Krebs, the woman who designed most of the Admiral and the interior of the S. S. President excursion boat.  In the late 1930's, she spent many hours on the Admiral during its construction. She found that steel wool was a slightly uncom- fortable occupational hazard. It was constantly found in the hem of her dress by the end of the day. She is quoted as saying, "We used steel wool for tufting the leatherette we put on the walls so we didn't have a fire hazard."  "The men would work with it on the benches. I always wore dresses when I was there--never slacks.  The hem of my dress would drag over the benches, and I would get small pieces of steel wool in it.  Then the steel wool would work its way into my stockings and, oh, would I be itchy." Krebs returned to the Admiral after many years for its reopening as a guest of the State of St. Louis economic development campaign.  She attended a public reopening ceremony which was sponsored by the S.S. Admiral Partners, the group that owns the boat and is completing its $30 million-plus renovation.  She also attended the State of St. Louis Party on the Admiral a couple of days before the reopening.  She hadn't been on the Admiral since shortly after its first excursion from the riverfront in June of 1940.  She does know of the extensive deterioration of the Admiral in recent years.  She is happy to know that it is being renovated, and she wishes those people well. The story of how Krebs got involved with designing first the interior of the President and several years later, the interior and exterior of the Admiral, is about as gutsy and revolutionary as her designs for the two steam-powered passenger boats. They were sleek and ultramodern for the times--a radical change from the gilded, gingerbread-type excursion boats that had plied the rivers for decades. The day after the Admiral was launched, it was stated that, "Old-time rivermen must have turned over in their graves on the day that the Admiral left the dock and was finally launched.  On the river was a ship that they probably never dreamed of being all steel, streamlined and air conditioned. And to make it worse on the old-timers, the ship was designed by a mere slip of a girl, Miss Mazie Krebs. "The ship is the S. S. Admiral, which made its initial voyage with a capacity crowd of excursionists, who spent most of their time wandering from vast room to vast room, exclaiming at sleek light tubing, sweeping staircases and functional furniture.  Krebs was born in St. Louis and spent most of her childhood traveling the country with her theatrical family.  Her parents divorced when she was a baby, and her mother, aunt and uncle formed a vaudeville group.  Krebs and her mother lived in south St. Louis when they were not on the road. She attended grade school in St. Louis and then went to Cleveland High, where she won a scholarship to the Washington University School of Fine Arts. Krebs said that she taught dancing to help pay college expenses.  But she was eager to begin a career as an artist, and she left the university to become a fashion illustrator for the Famous-Barr department stores.  After a year or so at the Famous-Barr, she landed a job that would lead her to the President and the Admiral.  She joined the staff of Taylor-Rebholz, a firm that specialized in graphic design work for large displays, outdoor posters, billboards and other types of advertising. Streckfus Steamers, Inc., the firm that built the President and the Admiral, was a client at Taylor- Rebholz, and Krebs did some work for Streckfus while she was there.  She was in Chicago in the early 1930's, designing large exhibits for the up- coming World's Fair of 1933, when Captain Joseph Streckfus, president of the Streckfus Steamers, came to visit.  He was planning a radical new excursion boat--the President--and looking for someone to design it.  "Miss Krebs said, that may- be the firm I am working for could possibly design it", but the firm was afraid of the job, because it was a floating thing.  That didn't scare Miss Krebs though, so she asked Captain Joe if she could submit some sketches.  "She found out later that he said 'yes' because he didn't know how to say 'no' to her.  Krebs worked for about a month, mostly on weekends, at putting together sketches for the President's interior.  Miss Krebs said that she did what she thought would go into the boat and she knew that she could do it.  She found out later that there were 20 other firms competing with her for the job.   ~~On To Page 2~~   All backgrounds are the sole property of me (Fiddlinsue). They are not to leave this site.  The above story was taken from the Streckfus Steamers magazine-dated 1934-1935 The images used on this page were saved in a scrapbook that my mother had compiled as a youngster. There was no dates or information as to where she obtained them from.   ©Fiddlinsue--October 18, 2002