SS President Coolidge motors ranged from a tenth horsepower to the 13,250 horsepower main motors. The ship had refrigerated cargo space. "President Coolidge" was initially designed for 350 first class, 150 "special" or intermediate class passengers with space for 1,260 passengers of all classes and a crew of 300. The ship was launched on 21 February 1931 after Mrs. Calvin C. Coolidge broke a bottle of water that came from a brook on the Coolidge farm in Vermont on the bow. "President Hoover" and "President Coolidge" ran between San Francisco and Manila via Kobe and Shanghai, and some round the World voyages that
The Man Who Knew Coolidge with Coolidge, such as: "I said, "Well, it's going to be a cold winter," and he came right back, "Yep." (p. 24)." A footnote on the first page of the section states that Coolidge was President from 1923 to 1929, which may appear odd considering that "The Man Who Knew Coolidge" was published in 1928. But Lewis knew that if Coolidge lived out his term, he would hold office into the year following the 1928 election. Coolidge succeeded to the Presidency on the unexpected death of President Warren G. Harding on August 2, 1923, and had won re-election in 1924,