Royal Mail Steamer Titanic
The story of the Titanic starts in 1898 with the publishing of Morgan Robertson's "Futlity". The story of the ocean liner Titan and on a voyage across the Atlantic struck an iceberg and sank with great loss of life. This novel written fourteen years before the Titanic's maiden voyage is a chilling prophecy of things yet to come.
Hull 401 was laid down on March 31, 1909 at the Harland and Wolff shipyards in Belfast, Ireland. 401 was to be the middle child of a great trio of sisters. These three were to be the most elegant, largest, safest, and most luxuriest ships afloat in the opening decades of the century. Competing against Cunard's Mauritania and Lusitania, these three were to commence the coveted weekly trans-Atlantic crossing. The first ship to be delivered to White Star was the RMS Olympic on May 31, 1911. She was at the time the largest ship afloat, one hundred feet longer than the Mauritania. The Olympic would have a long and eventfull life before her decommisioning in 1935.
The second ship to be delivered to White Star was 401 named Titanic. She even surpassed her sister in elegance and was crowned largest ship afloat. Titanic sailed on her maiden voyage on April 10, 1912 from Southampton, England to New York, NY. Four days into her voyage Titanic struck an iceberg and sank off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada. She took 1500 people down 12,500 feet of water to the ocean bottom, 705 people survived. The Titanic was discoverd on September 5, 1985 by a research team from the Woodshole Oceanigraphic Institute in Massachusetts. The Titanic as it turns out had broken in two prior to her foundering and the two sections lay a quarter mile apart from each other.
Today the wreck is owned under exclusive rights by RMS TITANIC INC. operating out of the United States.
TITANIC Today
Today the RMS Titanic lies 12,500 feet beneath the Atlantic Ocean. Her hull torn in two and laying 1/4 mile apart. Since 1985 several dives have produced evidence of what sank the ship. As it turnds out the iceberg bent several steel plates of the hull. The damage is no more the 12 sq.ft and runs along the supposed gash area thought to have sunk the ship. Titanic has been explored in the interior by James Cameron, film producer and director. His motion picture Titanic is the most historically acurate and amazing in that for the first time we see the condition of the interior of the ship. A piece of the hull of the Titanic was raised in August of 1998. The 20-ton section known as "The Big Piece" was recovered ten miles from the wreck site. Where it fell two years ago after being cut from tow. The piece will be added to the collection of Titanic artifacts that tour around the world.
Selected Reading on Titanic which you can purchase at the:
A Night to Remember by Walter Lord.
The Night Lives on by Walter Lord.
Lost Liners by Robert Ballard and Rick Archbold.
Titanic: Legacy of the World's Greatest Ocean Liner by Susan Wels.
Titanic by Thomas E. Bonsall.
Her Name Titanic by Charles Pellegrino.
The story of the Titanic as told by its survivors featuring
stories by Lawrence Beesley-2nd class passenger; Archibald Grace-1st class passenger;
Charles Lightoller-2nd officer; and Harold Bride-ships wireless operator; edited by Jack
Winocour.
Titanic: The death and life of a legend by Michael Davie.
The Discovery of the Titanic by Robert Ballard.
The Ghost from the Grand Banks by Arthur C. Clarke: A fictional
tale of the plan to raise the Titanic in 2012.
The Maiden Voyage by Geoffrey Marcus
Raise the Titanic by Clive Cussler
Dedicated to the men who stayed on and worked to the end while Titanic was slipping into history and them along with her.
Image courtesy of Titanic Adventure Out of Time' from Cyberflix.
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Updated 25 May, 1998