Titanic
I have always been intrigued by the Titanic, but my interest boomed with the recent development in how the side of the ship was damaged. I was amazed that instead of causing a gaping wound, as was previously believed, the iceberg that Titanic hit merely caused a series of small rips in the side of the ship. Sonar was used to determine that the side of the ship had six small slits that were no bigger than a single hand (http://www.titanic.cc/sonar.htm). This research amazed me because of the amount of water that passed through the small slits in the hull. I was always interested in ships, but the mystery that surrounded the Titanic sinking caused me to choose it for my senior project. At our first meeting (May 29, 1997), Mrs. Ferguson mentioned that I should try to incorporate my creative writing abilities into the project. Together, we came up with writing fictional diary entries for real passengers. My intent was to bring the people of the doomed liner to life through their thoughts throughout the trip. I chose which passengers' diaries I would write and then heavily researched each of these individuals. The craze from the movie Titanic made getting information difficult but I was able to gather the facts I needed fro
Hyslop, Forsyth, et al. Titanic Voices. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1997. "Encyclopidia Titanica" 14 July 1998. . Garrison, Webb. A Treasury of Titanic Tales. Nashville, TN: Rutledge Hill Press, 1998. If the White Star Line was indifferent to the steerage, so was everybody else. No one seemed to care about third class-neither the Press, the official Inquiries nor even the third class passengers themselves. The U.S. Congress only had three witnesses who were third class passengers. Two of these people testified that they were kept from going to the boat deck until most, if not all, of the lifeboats had left. However, no action was taken regarding these claims. They fell on deaf ears. Again, the facts do not suggest any deliberate conspiracy against third class passengers it was just that no one was interested in what they had to say. Their comments, opinions and concerns had no value. Even the third class passengers themselves, accustomed to being treated as inferiors, were not bothered. They expected class distinction as a part of life. Thus on the Titanic it seemed normal to many of them to wait until the first class passengers had gotten into their lifeboats. Many were satisfied just to be able to come up to the boat deck. It was not until they realized that there were no boats for most of them that anger and panic occurred (http://www.execpc.com/ ~reva/html3c5.htm).
Some common words found in the essay are:
Star Line, Harland Wolff, , Archibald Gracie, White Star, Lifeboat Fourteen, RMS Titanic, Titanic Southampton, Carter Ironically, English Fleet, third class, class passengers, third class passengers, white star, star line, women children, spignesi stephen, harland wolff, white star line, jj brown, rms titanic, april 14, colonel archibald gracie, passengers speak english, molly birth child,
Approximate Word count = 5245
Approximate Pages = 21 (250 words per page double spaced)
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