Gilbert M. Tucker Jr. (1880-1968): Titanic survivor (Section 19, Lot 9)
Gilbert M. Tucker Jr. climbed into lifeboat No. 7 of the RMS Titanic with three female companions and a Pomeranian dog wrapped in a blanket.
The lifeboat was loaded with 12 women, 13 men and three crew members, and it was the first lifeboat lowered as the disabled British passenger liner took on water and slowly sank after colliding with an iceberg. It was about half-full.
The decision to take a seat in lifeboat No. 7 saved Tucker’s life and gave him notoriety as a Titanic survivor. Tucker was one of 325 men who survived the April 15, 1912, catastrophe, while 1,509 people died, including 56 children and 114 women.
He spent the rest of his life carrying a heavy burden, trying to rationalize his survival while rebuffing rumors that he disguised himself as a woman to secure his spot in the lifeboat. Back home in Albany, Tucker heard mocking whispers of “women and children first” as he walked the streets, which sometimes led to scuffles with tormentors.
Tucker grew up in a family of privilege. His grandfather and father published a successful agricultural magazine in Albany, Country Gentleman. He graduated from Albany Academy in 1898 and Cornell University in 1901 before joining the family business as a writer and editor. In 1912, he toured Europe with his parents, a family tradition. It was a working vacation where they conducted interviews and gathered material for a series of articles on farming practices abroad. During their travels, the Tuckers met a woman from Philadelphia, her daughter and her daughter’s friend, Margaret Hays, a 24-year-old high school teacher from New York City. Gilbert, a 31-year-old bachelor, was smitten with Margaret and he began a courtship. Gilbert was disappointed when Margaret and the other two women, along with their dog, prepared to book a ship passage back to the U.S. A coal miners’ strike in Britain and a coal shortage idled many passenger liners, but the women managed to secure tickets on the Titanic’s maiden voyage. Tucker convinced his parents that he should change his travel plans and serve as their escort, because it was not prudent for the women to travel alone. He was elated that he would have more time alone with Margaret.
As lifeboat No. 7 was lowered chaotically 75 feet to the water, nearly tossing the passengers overboard, it took on water and passengers began to panic before crew members realized the drain plugs were not in. Tucker and the others saw the ship sink out of sight, accompanied by “screams too horrible for words,” according to one of the women. After three hours in the lifeboat, they were rescued by the Carpathia.
Back in Albany, Hays broke up with Tucker, and at age 41, he married Mildred Stewart in 1922. The couple had no children. They lived for decades in a 6,000-square-foot 1830s brick mansion and sprawling family estate in Glenmont called Rock Hill. The Tuckers later moved to an Arts & Crafts bungalow in Pine Hills. In the 1960s, they moved to California, where they lived in an assisted living center in Carmel. Tucker died in 1968, his wife in 1981.
“I never heard him say one word about the Titanic,” said Norman Rice, 88, a longtime trustee of Albany Rural Cemetery and emeritus director of the Albany Institute of History & Art. Rice dined regularly with the Tuckers, took dance lessons with them, vacationed together in Cape Cod and visited them in California. “I didn’t know anything about him surviving the Titanic until after he died.”
Rice recalled Tucker as a slight, soft-spoken and well-dressed fellow who was financially comfortable and enjoyed a life of leisure. He kept a small office with a secretary in the old D&H Building, now SUNY headquarters, where he tracked his investments, including early shares of IBM stock that performed spectacularly.
Tucker by midlife had managed to put the Titanic infamy behind him. He authored four books and became a leading voice for Georgists, a tax-reform group based on the writings of economist Henry George. Tucker left his estate in two trusts currently valued at about $2 million to Albany Academy, where the library is named for his father, Gilbert M. Tucker Sr. The school has received funds from the smaller trust and the larger one was set up as a life income beneficiary instrument. Tucker stipulated that two children of the couple’s longtime aides, who are in their 60s and live on the West Coast, will receive interest disbursements until they die. After their deaths, the remaining assets will go to Albany Academy, where Tucker was a trustee. He described himself as a “devoted son” of the school.
Tucker was cremated in California and his remains were interred next to his wife’s in the Tucker family plot, Section 19, Lot 9, off South Ridge Road overlooking the Moordanaers Kill. It means “Murderer’s Creek” in Dutch. Tucker’s granite marker makes no mention of the Titanic.