On a still summer evening in 1907, Bruce Ismay and his wife Florence arrived at the residence of Lord and Lady Pirrie. During this night, plans were launched for two ships, and a third later. The plans were born to outdo White Star Line’s leading competitor the Cunard Line. For years, the two companies had held a strong competition for the Atlantic passenger trade. When the Cunard Line launched the Lusitania and Mauritania, White Star recognized the need to make a bigger and better fleet. Lusitania and Mauritania were considered the fastest and most luxurious ships afloat. In order for White Star to out build Cunard, they would have to make bigger and faster ships right? Wrong. White Star took a completely different view. Their new breed of super liner would be 50%larger than Lusitania’s 30,000 gross tons, and far more luxurious. They would not, however, be faster. White Star’s new idea was comfort. They reasoned that if the ship’s speed were reduced, there would be less vibration, thus enhancing passenger comfort. What the ships lacked in speed would be made up for in pure luxury. They would be so luxurious that first class on any other ship would equal second-class on the Titanic. Even third class was more luxurious. These ships would be the ultimate.

After the meeting in 1907, designing for the ships began. Original plans called for a three deck tall dining saloon capped by a massive dome. Plans also included a spa the size of the dining saloon in the lower sections of the ships. In the end, these designs would be scaled down, and some, in the case of the Grand Staircase, would become more elaborate.

Imagining what the three sister ships would become was one thing, actually building and docking them would be another. Neither Southampton nor New York had docking facilities to accommodate the approximately 890 feet. Ismay had to travel to New York and fight to get permission to extend the International Mercantile Marine piers in New York to accommodate the ships. What is more, no place in the world had a dry dock, basin or a crane large enough to construct the monsters, so three dry docks were merged into two, and a 220 foot gantry was build to span over the ships. Once the ships were being built, teams of twenty horses had to haul the fifteen and a half ton anchors to the site. The four funnels, three hooked up to boilers and a fourth dummy hooked up to small auxiliary machines, were large enough to drive trains through. Again, once the ‘shells’ of the ships were built, they had to be launched and then towed to the outfitting basin. In order to launch the ships, the River Lagan had to be dredged to accommodate the 50+-foot draft of the three sisters. To move titanic from the dry dock to the water took 23 tons of tallow, train oil, and soft soap before the ship slid out under her own weight. While sliding down the ways, she reached 12 knots, the maximum speed of many smaller ships of the day, before she was stopped in the water. Once she reached Harland and Wolff’s outfitting basin, it took ten months to turn the empty hull into the world’s grandest ship, not to mention the several million man-hours included.

The final ship would include state of the art facilities, such as bathrooms. The bathrooms were very advanced for their time, but would be considered stone-age material today. Some of the first class staterooms shared bathroom facilities. First class was by far the most immaculate. Some of the rooms include a lounge, smoking room, reading and writing room, two verandah and palm courts, an A la Carte restaurant, café Parisian, a barber shop, pool, Turkish baths, and even the ultra modern steam bath. The original spa was split up into three sections. The gymnasium, which was moved to the boat deck, the pool and Turkish baths, were moved to E deck, and the squash courts, which also became located on E deck.

Everywhere on the ship, the passengers were treated like royalty. Even the third class had proper waiters that bustled about its gleaming dining room. In every way, all of the passengers had been plopped in the lap of luxury. The second class had comfortable cabins and immaculate furnishings. Titanic was truly a legend.

The Titanic was completed and ready for it’s April the tenth 1912 sailing date, and was delivered on time. Because of the ongoing coal strike, many passengers from other ships were transferred to the Titanic to conserve coal. Nothing was going to delay the sailing. At noon, several tugs began pulling the Titanic out towards the River Test. As the titanic fired up her massive engines, the three propellers twirled under the water, churning up a massive force that would eventually push the ship along at 21 knots. As the Titanic moved gracefully down the narrow channel, she passed the New York, which was moored on the side. The pull of the ship snapped the New York’s mooring ropes and caused the ship to swing out towards the Titanic. A nearby tug pushed the ship out of the way just on time. This accident was similar to the Olympic’s when she pulled the Hawke into her path, ripped her hull open and threw a propeller blade. Many of the passengers on deck murmured that it was an ominous start to a maiden voyage.

After the near collision with the New York, the voyage went smoothly. Passengers were pampered, and cared for. Every night, the first class passengers swept down the sweeping staircase to the dining saloon and stuffed down an eleven-course meal. The second-class passengers enjoyed hearty meals and polite conversation in their understated, yet elegant rooms, and third class passengers were dazzled by the actual thought that someone would go through so much trouble for them.

When Sunday, April 14th came around, the steady life of a cruise ship had settled in. Although church services were held in every class, second and third class passengers were invited up for the first class service. Captain Smith led songs, and the three very different social groups sang along.

After the service, daily life continued with teas, and parties. The women relaxed in the writing room while the men talked politics over brandies in the smoking room. On the bridge, the officers took their watches and noticed a chill developing in the air. When night came, passengers began thinking of their arrival in New York. Some passengers sent out telegrams for their private train cars to meet them. Others made plans for parties, and others, like Mrs. Reyerson, thought of her son’s funeral, which awaited her in New York. None of the passengers were aware of the seven ice warnings that had been received that day. None knew they were headed for disaster.

It is reported that during the busy hours of the telegraph office, the Marconi wireless workers received an ice warning that reported a field of ice and several large bergs. The workers, who were swamped, put the message in a pile marked delivered. They couldn’t have known that the coordinates for the ice field were directly in the Titanic’s path.

At 11:40 PM, the lookouts spotted a large iceberg directly in the ship’s path. They rang the warning bell three times, and called the bridge. The bridge then game orders to the engine room to reverse the engines and to the wheelman to turn hard to starboard. The ship couldn’t turn fast enough, and hit the berg, opening up small rips and tears in the starboard side.

Ironically, if the engines hadn’t been reversed, the Titanic would have cleared berg. When Titanic’s engines were reversed, the forward thrust was lowered. If this hadn’t happened, the Titanic would have been going faster which means more water passing across the rudder, meaning the ship would have turned in time.

The tremor caused by the collision wasn’t that noticeable inside the luxurious first class cabins. Those sitting near one of the delicate chandeliers might have heard the tinkling of the crystal beading. Others in bed might have seen the water waver in the water flasks that were kept chilled on their nightstands. Later on, when passengers were walking about trying to figure out why the engines had stopped, they probably would have noticed that their feet fell awkwardly onto the stairs, and the decks were slowly beginning to slant downwards towards the bow. For the second-class passengers, it was slightly more noticeable. A shudder was felt, and a low moaning of the ship was audible throughout the comfortable corridors. One passenger described the noise as a person rubbing a fingernail down a piece of silk. Many of the passengers were told that the ship had thrown a propeller blade. For one second class passenger, the experience was quite different. His porthole had been opened for a breath of fresh air, and a chunk of ice had been tossed inside as the berg scraped along the hull. In the bow section of third class, the single male passengers were jarred out of their beds and many were thrown onto the floor.

At any rate, after the first half-hour, most of the passengers knew that something was wrong. First class passengers were being disturbed from their card games, sleep, or reading sessions and being told to locate their lifejackets, which could be found on top of the armoire in their cabins. Second and third class passengers were also being awakened and being told to find lifebelts. Third class passengers received a loud knock, a kick at the door to open it, and rude, loud shouts while the lifebelts were thrown on the floor. Many of the third class did not speak English and were just frightened into a panic at all of the yelling and shouting.

During this time, the crew was ordered to prepare lifeboats. After the officers and crew had prepared the boats, they had to face the daunting challenge of convincing the well bred passengers to leave the solid and seemingly safe ship, step over the four foot gap between ship and lifeboat. Many women panicked at seeing this gap and refused to board. Ida Straus, wife of Isadore Straus, the owner of Macy’s Department store, was asked to enter a boat. She refused saying that her husband and her had never been separated during their marriage and it would not happen now. The officer loading the boat then said he would allow Mr. Strauss to board thinking no one would mind a kindly older gentleman getting on. Mr. Strauss refused. In another case, Mr. Guggenheim refused to enter a boat, or even take a lifebelt. (This was portrayed in the movie, and just so you don’t think I am taking things from the movie, I looked it up and it actually happened in real life.) Mr. Guggenheim said he was dressed in his best and prepared to go down as a gentleman. He did. As well as the many examples of bravery, there were quite a few incidences of cowardice. Bruce Ismay, director of the White Star Line, sneaked onto a boat. Because of his behavior that night, he was marked for life. He became the subject of many political cartoons and society columns. His wife later stated that the sinking of the Titanic had basically ruined their life.

The Titanic was equipped with sixteen watertight compartments. Actually, they were semi-watertight. The only problem with them was that the bulkheads that comprised the compartments ended at E deck. Therefore, if enough water came in to fill a compartment it would spill over the top, flooding back and back until the ship sank. On the Titanic, when five compartments were flooded, the water would flood back and back, and the ship would sink. If only four were flooding, then she would be fine. Let me explain it this way. If you take a ship, like the Titanic, and you find its center of gravity and then push a rod through it so it penetrates both starboard and port side and held the pole up into the air, the ship should stay balanced. Titanic was in the balanced condition before she collided with the iceberg. Now, if you add weights to the bow end of the ship that is in the air on a rod, the ship would tilt vertically in the air with the stern up in the air and the bow pointed down. Now picture that the water flooding into the Titanic is the weight. Now this next part is hard to explain. The water would support the ship, causing it to balance out at some point before it tilts to the vertical point. Now picture your model ship in the water, and add more weights. The bow will go further and further into the water. Eventually it would become unbalanced and would sink. On Titanic, if the water were only flooding the first four compartments, she would balance out. Once she had five compartments flooding, she would become unbalanced.

At around one, a state of panic had erupted aboard the rapidly tilting decks of Titanic. Officers were forced to use guns to control this panic. In the end, this didn’t work, and caused even more panic. The ship was now rising up out of the water. By around 1:45, the stern had risen 30 to 35 feet out of the water. The polished decks were now too steep to walk safely, the boats were gone, and people were jumping off the sides or using the lifeboat lines to climb off the foundering vessel. Inside the ship everything that wasn’t secured to the floor was falling toward the bow. Eight grand pianos, 8,000 dishes, 200 potted palms, trunks, clothing, tables, armoires, and over 500 deck chairs fell toward the bow and made a large roaring sound in doing so. This roaring was mixed with a deep moan from inside the ship as the hull plating began to split apart between the third and fourth funnels. The boldly riveted outer hull of the luxury liner began to swell around the water line. Inside, the floor of the A La Carte restaurant and the smoking room turned to waves as the ornate columns split and the ceilings collapsed. The stern of the ship fell back level with the water, but it was still attached to the bow, which was completely underwater. The weight of the bow pulled the stern vertical into the air and then detached. The bow fell down and its knife like edge plowed up a wave of dirt as it landed on the bottom of the North Atlantic. The stern was still vertical standing in the water. Some say it stayed like that for two minutes, others say it didn’t happen at all. Scientists have proved almost beyond a reasonable doubt that the Titanic split apart before she sank like I explained above, that is my theory as well. The stern began to sink, and all of the air still inside had to get out somehow, therefore, as the stern sank, it basically imploded. At approximately 2:15 Am on April 15th, the Titanic slipped below the glassy surface. It landed a mere fragment of what it was, it’s decks collapsed, the plating hanging off in pieces. The unsinkable Titanic was gone