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SS CENTRAL AMERICA
The Ship of Gold

Compare this Central America ship model to all others across the Internet and you'll see a vast difference.  At ModelShipMaster.com, we build nautical art pieces that are used to grace beautiful homes and prestigious offices and that is our passion.   

Our Central America model was featured in an exhibit of S.S. Central America treasures in Denver in Sept 2022. https://instoremag.com/hardrock-summit-to-bring-historic-gold-treasures-to-denver. The model was commissioned  in 4/2022 by a local couple who has a precious stone gallery in Laguna Beach.

The SS Central America was an 280-foot wooden-hulled, copper-sheathed, three-masted side-wheel steamship launched in 1853 as the SS George Law.  Operating during the California Gold Rush era, the ship was in continuous service on the Atlantic leg of the Panama Route between New York and San Francisco, making 43 round trips between New York and Panama.

On September 3rd, 1857, 477 passengers and 101 crew on board the SS Central America left the Panamanian port of Colón and sailed for New York City.  The ship was heavily laden with over three tons of gold.  The precious cargo included approximately 5,200 recently-minted $20- denomination ("Double Eagle") gold pieces produced in 1857 at the San Francisco Mint. The gold for these coins was mined during the California Gold Rush. There also was a much smaller quantity of other historic gold coins that circulated in the Wild West. The cargo also contained privately-made gold coins and ingots produced by such historic, government-supervised San Francisco Gold Rush-era assayers.

On September 9th, the SS Central America was hit by a Category 2 hurricane off the coast of the Carolinas. Two days later, 105 mph winds shredded all her sails. At noon, a leak in one of the seals to the paddle wheels gave way to seawater and her boiler could no longer maintain fire. The passengers and crew flew the ship's flag upside down (a universal sign of distress.) No one came.

A bucket brigade was formed and the passengers and crew spent the night fighting a losing battle against the rising water. In the morning of September 10th, two ships came to the rescue. 153 people, primarily women and children, managed to make their way over in lifeboats. 425 people still on board the Central America went with her to the bottom at around 8 pm that night.

Unable to meet payrolls or pay creditors because of the loss of the gold cargo, New York banks began to fail and stores and factories began to close, touching off a financial crash in the United States and Europe. It was "The Panic of 1857."

In 1988, an Ohio engineer named Tommy Thompson discovered the shipwreck using sonar and robotic technology he developed.  A remotely operated vehicle (ROV) was sent down on 11 September 1988.  Significant amounts of gold and artifacts were recovered. The total value of the recovered gold was estimated at $100–150 million. A gold ingot weighing 80 lb (36 kg) sold for a record $8 million and was recognized as the most valuable piece of currency in the world at that time.  He was stopped by lawsuit filed by thirty-nine insurance companies.   Tommy Thompson's team argued that the gold had been abandoned.  After a legal battle, 92% of the gold was awarded to the discovery team in 1996.  And the team only excavated only 5% of the shipwreck.

Thompson was sued in 2005 by several of the investors who had provided $12.5 million in financing, and in 2006 by several members of his crew, over a lack of returns for their respective investments.  Thompson went into hiding in 2012.  He was arrested by US Marshals in 2015 after several years of searching at a West Palm Beach, Florida hotel.  In November 2018 Thompson agreed to surrender 500 gold coins; but then claims he doesn't have access to the missing coins.

In March 2014, a contract was awarded to Odyssey Marine Exploration to conduct archeological recovery and conservation of the remaining shipwreck.

About the construction of the SS Central America model wooden scale model

37" long x 19" tall x 7.5" wide  (1/87 HO scale) $3,490 Shipping and insurance in the contiguous US included. Other places: $400 flat rate.

22" long x 12" tall x 6" wide  (1/144 scale) $2,955  Shipping and insurance in the contiguous US included. Other places: $300 flat rate.