"Massachusetts" was built as a fast cargo vessel for the New England Navigation Company by William Cramp & Sons of Philadelphia in 1907. In 1911 the ship was sold to the Maine Steamship Company and converted to passenger service. The next year "Massachusetts" was sold to the Eastern Steamship Corporation. The ship then operated in overnight coastal passenger steamer service through the Cape Cod Canal and Long Island Sound between Boston and New York City. After the US entered World War I, "Massachusetts" and her sister ship , were among eight civilian steamships purchased to lay the North Sea Mine Barrage.