Instructor's Notes
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Multiple Editors | Photo Essay |
Observing the Titanic |
On its maiden voyage from Southampton, United Kingdom, to New York, United States, in April 1912, the RMS Titanic hit an iceberg off Newfoundland and sank within three hours, killing more than 1,500 people. Approximately 700 passengers and crewmembers were rescued. Seventy-three years later, in 1985, the wreck was discovered lying two and a half miles beneath the Atlantic’s surface, by a U.S.-French team led by Robert Ballard of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. Many explorers and scientists have visited the Titanic since, including filmmaker James Cameron. Click through the photos to observe scenes of the luxurious ocean liner, then and now, and then answer the questions below.
Meaning
When the Titanic sank in 1912, why do you think that newspaper accounts at the time paid much attention to the prominent men who had lost their lives and less attention to the many European immigrants and average working-class and middle-class passengers? What do you think of the “women and children first” policy in place at the time?
Writing Strategies