The Titanic struck the iceberg 95 years ago yesterday near midnight and went down 95 years ago today. Dd and I went to see the Titanic Exhibition on Saturday. It is incredible. If it comes to your town I highly recommend that you go see it. Even if you have seen it before. it may have a completely different set of artifacts than the ones you saw the first time. They were telling us that they rotate the exhibits so that the artifacts can “rest” for 3 or 4 years after having been on display,
When you go in they give you a “boarding pass” that contains information on one of the passengers and at the end of the tour you find out if “you” (the person on the card) survived or not. They had the biggest piece to have been recovered there and it is huge. They also had another smaller large piece that was attached to the really big one when it was recovered but they had to separate them. This is the first time the two pieces have been displayed together since the recovery. They even had a small piece in a glass case with a hole in it so you could put your finger thru the hole and actually touch a part of the Titanic. One display had what looked like a large piece of foam core cut into the shape of an iceberg and lit with black light to make it glow. However, when you get right up next to it you realize it is really ice.
At the end of the tour I found out that I survived but dd’s person (and her 4 children) did not.
They also told the story of two children that were traveling alone who avoided the crush of people trying to get up to the boat deck from the 3rd class level by climbing up a rope on the outside of the ship. The little boy was having such fun on the rope that he did not stop at the boat deck but kept climbing. His sister was screaming his name and crying when a man reached out and plucked him from the ropes and put both of them into a lifeboat. That man was John Jacob Astor. He did not survive but the two children did and rejoined their family in the US. In fact, they lived changed their names (don’t know why) and lived in Georgia. Then we found out the brother died here in Atlanta on May 31, 1981. Just 3 days before dd was born!
We were not allowed to take photos inside the exhibit but here is a picture that was in the lobby. It is about as tall as the piece of the ship that they have on display.

Me and the Titanic

Dd and the Titanic

quote:

Originally posted by mountaingirl:
[...] I thought that there were laws against actually disturbing artifacts from ships that have sunk - [...]
Lynne

I am not sure about the laws but I think that the first person (or company) to locate a sunken ship has exclusive salvage rights to whatever they find.

These exhibits are very tastefully done. There are large panels on the walls telling the story of who they belonged to (if they know).

One display shows rows and rows of au gratin dishes lined up in the sand unbroken just the way they found them and on the wall is a photograph of them still in the water where they found them.

Wow, I would love to see that exhibit. I was completely enthralled with the underwater scenes that I've seen. I thought that there were laws against actually disturbing artifacts from ships that have sunk - maybe I just heard that somewhere. Isn't it kind of sacreligious? Guess not. Were there lots of artifacts? I am surprised there were actual pieces of the ship at the exhibit. Sounds so cool.

Lynne

We saw the Titanic exhibit several years ago in Cleveland. It was amazing. It sounds like they have kept much of the exhibit in tact, except for the change in the various artifacts.

I survived (I was a first class passenger), my dh, a fireman, did not.

I would love to see it again.