Maureen O'Hara O'Hara beat Lauren Bacall to the role as she was busy with other engagements. Though the film was critically acclaimed, Crowther of "The New York Times" felt that the characters of O'Hara and the daughter could have been made "more humorous and spirited than they are". The following year, O'Hara appeared in the CBS television film, "Mrs. Miniver", but despite some critics approving her performance, most thought that the remake was ill-timed and that she could not top Greer Garson's performance in the 1942 Oscar-winning film. In 1961, O'Hara portrayed Kit Tilden in the western "The Deadly Companions", Sam Peckinpah's
SS Empire Miniver Columbia River Shipbuilding Company in Portland, Oregon. Though she was completed too late for the war, she was commissioned into the Naval Overseas Transportation Service (NOTS) of the United States Navy as USS "West Cobalt" (ID-3836) in January 1919. After her one overseas trip for the Navy—delivering grain products to Danzig—she was decommissioned in May 1919 and returned to the USSB. "West Cobalt" had a relatively uneventful merchant career for the USSB and, after her 1933 sale, for the Lykes Brothers Steamship Company. In June 1940, "West Cobalt" was sold to British interests and renamed "Empire Miniver". Just over four