In November 1918, a young Walt Disney stepped onto a ship named the Vauban, which was set to take him and his Red Cross Ambulance Corps unit from the United States all the way to France. For a 16-year-old boy who had never traveled farther east than Illinois or farther west than Colorado, this was a sizable adventure; Walt’s journey to France marked his first-ever encounter with the ocean.
It would not be his last. In the years to come, Walt spent time on freighters, steamships, cruise ships...