The Titanic Exhibit

When I was first married there was an exhibit that had come to northern Utah of Tutankhamen and various things that had been unearthed in his tomb. I wanted to go so bad, but I didn't take a stand to make my husband see how important it was to me. I've always wanted a career in Science, but I realize I lack patience and intelligence to be an archeologist. I did apply to Scripps because most of all I wanted to be a marine biologist. The finding of the Titanic was like the best of both. I am so interested in every aspect of it's sinking (actually other ships as well but mostly the Titanic). So while we were in Vegas I insisted we go to the Titanic exhibit. As we went in we were given tickets with the info of a specific passenger. Mine was in first class and recovering from a divorce. One of my daughters was given a name that was also a first class passenger. She was 19 and expecting. My oldest was given a second class passenger and not as much was known about her. My husband was given a first class man who is actually mentioned in the movie, Cosmo something or other. The display items were recovered from the debris field. Nothing from the ship itself. The preservation is astounding and like all things I do like this I feel an overwhelming sadness and sickness of the waste.

We were near the end and there was a tour guide in there that came to talk to us and as my kids love to point out, I can strike up a conversation with anyone and immediately feel that I've made a valuable friend. We were looking at a bottle of champagne still corked and mostly full. I talked to him about it and he said many bottles of champagne were intact but no wine or other bottled beverage. I speculated that it could be the pressure of the bubbles in the champagne. He told us that things that were packed in crates were often found intact because they gradually adjusted to the pressure. Theoretically because the wood was gradually eaten away and so the water got in slowly. I personally think the pressure inside the champagne helped but I don't really know. It had to be brought up so slowly to stay intact. In one room they had an actual iceberg and we were encouraged to touch it. We were told that saltwater freezes at a much colder temperature (which makes sense to me) but icebergs are generally freshwater which I did NOT know. In the last room they have the largest piece of the Titanic that has been brought up. It's huge, but tiny in comparison to the size of the ship. There were lists of survivors and of the lives that were lost. All of the people whose names we brought through survived. It amazes me how many men survived, even second class, and of course Bruce Ismay. We told my husband we weren't speaking to him for the rest of the trip because he took the seat of a woman or child on a life boat. We were teasing, of course, but sometimes I wonder how that must have felt, surviving.

In the end the guide we'd talked to pointed out a picture of a woman in a collage of pictures. Her name was Violet Jessop. I had just watched a documentary about the Brittanic. It was a sister ship to the Titanic and was built improving on the areas they felt the Titanic lacked. The question in the documentary was what had been the cause? It was believed to be hit by a torpedo from a submarine. They found the wreckage and evidence it was an underwater mine. Violet survived tragedy of the three sister ships: The Olympic, Titanic, and the Brittanic. The Olympic had several bad collisions that proved fatal for passengers of the other ships and the Titanic and Brittanic both sunk. She was onboard all three during these tragedies and survived. I also had read the news of the passing of the last Titanic survivor on May 31st. Elizabeth (Millvina)Gladys Dean was about 9 months old, the youngest passenger, when the Titanic sunk. Her mother and brother survived as well, but her father was among the lost. She died in a nursing home at age 97.