SS American was a steel-hulled, single propeller cargo ship built at Chester, Pennsylvania, by the Delaware River Iron Shipbuilding and Engine Works for the American-Hawaiian Steamship Company and the Hawaiian sugar trade.

As one of the first four ships ordered by the American-Hawaiian Steamship Company after its 1899 formation, American was used on the Hawaii – New York sugar trade via the Straits of Magellan.

In 1901 she set a record for the fastest New York – San Francisco ocean passage, making the voyage in 59 days.

Taken up for wartime service after the United States entered World War I in April 1917, she completed two round-trip voyages to France without incident.

[10] At the start of her American-Hawaiian career, American sailed in scheduled service from New York and Philadelphia around South America via the Straits of Magellan, up to San Francisco and from there to Honolulu.

Insurers initially made the company pay a 6% premium for taking its large ships through the treacherous 300-nautical-mile (560 km) channel in the Straits of Magellan, rather than the safer passage around Cape Horn.

This loss of access, coupled with the fact that the Panama Canal was not yet open, caused American-Hawaiian to return to its historic route of sailing around South America via the Straits of Magellan in late April.

[14] In October 1915, landslides closed the Panama Canal and all American-Hawaiian ships, including American, returned to the Straits of Magellan route again.

[4] On 4 October, American began her third trip to France in a convoy escorted by the cruiser Denver and headed to Bordeaux.

[18] At 02:28 on 7 October, while about 250 nautical miles (460 km) south of Halifax,[19] the steering gear engine of USS West Gate—ahead and to the starboard of American—jammed, sending the ship veering sharply to the port.

West Gate's crew put the ship's engine at half speed to try to drop out of the convoy, but minutes later, men on the bridge sighted the red light from the oncoming American.

R. B. Vandervoort, and six men he had personally escorted to a life raft were picked up by one of American's lifeboats at 06:00, after some 3½ hours in the water.

After calling at that British port on 9 December, American docked at Marseilles, before leaving for New York in the new year, arriving there on 9 February 1919.

Though the company had abandoned its original Hawaiian sugar routes by this time,[17] American sailed in inter-coastal service through the Panama Canal.