Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. The Holland America Line was founded in 1873 as the Dutch-America Steamship Company, a shipping and passenger line. Because it was headquartered in Rotterdam and provided service to the Americas, it became known as Holland America Line (HAL). Its headquarters are in Seattle, Washington.The first ships sailed between Rotterdam and New York in 1872. Until scheduled transatlantic passenger transport ended New York (Hoboken) remained the main American terminal. Other services were started later that century to South America and Baltimore. A pure cargo service to New York was added in 1899. In the early years of the 20th century other North American ports were added to the service. In the first 25 years of its existence the line carried 400,000 people from the old to the new world.