Director Wyndham Gittens reportedly led a “posse” from Triangle Film Corporation’s Culver City, CA, studio on a hunt for an “elusive man-eating shark,” according to the 21 October 1917 Los Angeles Times. Gittens needed the shark for his film and offered a fifty-dollar reward for its capture to residents of the Japanese fishing village near Santa Monica, CA. After several failed attempts by the fishermen, Gittens successfully landed the shark with the aid of numerous coworkers. Lead actor Monte Blue later performed an underwater battle scene with the fish, which may or may not have been captured alive.
       As stated in the 24 November 1917 [York, PA] Gazette, Monte Blue also performed “a thirty-foot dive from the rail of a burning ship” during a nighttime shoot. Despite his inability to see the water below or the tugboat carrying Gittens and the cameraman, Blue made the dive and was picked up soon after.
       The 28 October 1917 Los Angeles times revealed that star Claire McDowell stood in an open boat holding the same pose for ninety minutes, waiting for the burning ship in the background to explode. Although Gittens offered her an opportunity to rest, she declined for fear that the explosion would occur in her absence and the scene would be ruined. The actress eventually collapsed from exhaustion.
       Following the close of production, articles in the 10 November 1917 Moving Picture World and the 8 December 1917 Motography noted that the film featured Triangle’s “three-masted barkentine,” the Fremont, which was built in Philadelphia, PA, in 1850 as a slave ship. It was later used as a “blockade runner” during the Civil War, a cargo ship for the Hawaiian sugar industry, and a fishing boat on the Bering Sea.
       The Ship of Doom was released on 2 December 1917 and opened that same day at the Hippodrome Theatre in Fort Worth, TX. Although reviews were generally positive, the film fared poorly at the box office, as indicated by a chart in the 23 February 1918 Motion Picture News.
       The National Film Preservation Board (NFPB) included this film on its list of Lost U.S. Silent Feature Films as of February 2021.