- Title: Frére Jacques
- Author: Imprimerie Transatlantique
- Date: Friday October 9, 1959
- Condition: Excellent - some age related toing, all else fine
- Inches: 9 1/2 x 13 3/8 [Paper]
- Centimeters: 24.13 x 33.97 [Paper]
- Product ID: 308742
An attractive large-format French Line luncheon menu from the SS Liberté, dated Friday, 9 October 1959, titled Frère Jacques and printed by Imprimerie Transatlantique in Paris, with a charming Jean A. Mercier cover illustration of a young monk ringing a great bell high in a stone belfry arch while doves wheel above a sunlit French countryside, framed within the line’s characteristic double green border. Opening to a fully bilingual French–English layout, the menu presents an extensive midday bill of fare—from hors-d’oeuvre, soups, eggs, fish, entrées and vegetables to pastas, grillades, cold buffet, salads, cheeses, entremets, fruits, beverages and wines—arranged around the Paquebot “Liberté” crest and elegantly scripted “Déjeuner / Luncheon” heading. The verso continues the theme with a printed musical score and complete French lyrics for the traditional round Frère Jacques, accompanied by a decorative vignette of a bell and swallows, underscoring CGT’s mid-century practice of pairing popular children’s songs and playful Mercier artwork with its first-class dining ephemera.
Background on the Compagnie Générale
Compagnie Générale Transatlantique, commonly known as the French Line, was a major French shipping company founded in 1855 by brothers Émile and Isaac Pereire under the name Compagnie Générale Maritime, originally chartered by the French government to carry mail, passengers, and cargo across the Atlantic. Renamed Compagnie Générale Transatlantique in 1861, the line developed a prestigious fleet of steamships and later great ocean liners—culminating in famous vessels such as France and Normandie—that symbolized French technological ambition and Art Deco elegance on the North Atlantic route between Le Havre and New York.
Through the late 19th and early 20th centuries CGT expanded rapidly, operating dozens of passenger and freight ships and becoming an important instrument of French commercial and cultural presence abroad. By the postwar era, when your 1959 Liberté menu was issued, the company was firmly identified with refined onboard service, distinctive red-and-black funnels, and richly designed printed ephemera that helped make transatlantic travel an extension of French hospitality and style.