Stephen Spignesi of New Haven, author of "The Titanic for Dummies." (Handout, Handout )
Fact No. 1: There was nobody named Jack Dawson on the Titanic.
Fact No. 2: The man named J. Dawson who was among the passengers and died on the Titanic, and whose grave movie fans visit in Nova Scotia, was not Jack, the character Leonardo DiCaprio played in that 1997 blockbuster movie.
"The Titanic for Dummies" will teach you that, and thousands more facts about the legendary disaster.
New Haven author Stephen Spignesi is responsible for this reference book published in January. Spignesi also wrote "The Complete Titanic: From the Ship's Earliest Blueprints to the Epic Film" in 1998.
So if his first Titanic book was "complete," why write a new one?
"I was already a 'Dummies' author. I've written three of them," Spignesi said, referring to "Second Homes for Dummies," "Lost Books of the Bible for Dummies" and "Native American History for Dummies." "I had done the [Titanic] book in 1998. I had already put in the time to do the research and had a massive archive of books, articles, videos and facts."
With that research in hand, he persuaded Wiley, the publisher, to let him write "The Titanic For Dummies" on the 100th anniversary of the disaster, which happened on April 14-15, 1912. More than 700 passengers and crew members survived the sinking of the Titanic, but more than 1,500 died.
Spignesi, 58, who teaches English and history at University of New Haven in West Haven, said that "The Titanic for Dummies" is different in format from his previous book.
"'The Complete Titanic' was straightforward history, and the 'Dummies' books are very modular and nonsequential," he said. "They're meant entirely as reference books."
But he said in addition to the new format, the new book also contains updated information based on new research and inquiries, or what he referred to as "a boatload of information."
"Did I just say 'boatload?'" he said.
New And Improved
"The Titanic for Dummies," in 20 easily accessible chapters, describes in detail the ship's construction, the socioeconomic status of the passengers, life aboard the ship, the first four days of the trip, before disaster struck, how people survived once the ship hit the iceberg, firsthand accounts of the sinking, press coverage, what went wrong, later efforts to find the remains, movies about the Titanic, myths, artifacts and one startling chapter about a book written in 1898, "Futility / Wreck of the Titan," whose story had eerie similarities to the tragedy that happened 14 years later.
Spignesi said that for him and for the general public, the enduring fascination with the Titanic tragedy — which isn't even close to being the most fatal maritime disaster in world history — is largely due to the fact that it sank on its maiden voyage.
"Actually, what the Titanic was trying to do was ... a routine journey. For immigration, mail and cargo, a steamship was the only way to get across the pond," he said. "But to sink on a maiden voyage? ... If I walked into a movie producer's office and said, 'I have a great idea for a movie: Get the biggest ship ever, fill it with millionaires and have it sink hitting an iceberg on its first trip,' it would be considered too far-fetched."
"If the Olympic [another ship] sank on its fourth or fifth or sixth trip to New York, I don't think it would be anywhere near as important or interesting as the Titanic," he said. "Here we have a $7 1/2 million ship, the ultimate in luxury, some of the richest people in the world on board, the biggest moving thing on the planet, and it sinks on its first trip. It's ludicrous. Truth is stranger than fiction."
But other aspects of the tragedy are just as fascinating; Spignesi called the entire episode "human error, combined with design error."
He said if the ship truly were to be "unsinkable," it would have to have been built with all the watertight compartments closed off by thick ship walls that extended all the way up to the top of the boat.
But human error played just as big a role, starting with the British Board of Trade, which still operated under laws based on ships about 10,000 to 26,000 tons. The Titanic was 46,000 tons.
"White Star Line was in total compliance with the laws of the time, but the laws were outdated," he said. "The laws required 16 lifeboats. They put four additional collapsible lifeboats on board, to make people think they were going overboard protecting people's safety."
"Did I just say 'go overboard?'" Spignesi said. "That's bad. You really can't help saying things like that, though."
Panic At The Lifeboats
The Titanic lacked mandatory lifeboat drills for all passengers, and its crew was untrained in evacuation procedures, resulting in panic and the launching of lifeboats half-full. "It's just mind-boggling that an extra 400 people died because the Titanic crew had been given no time for a lifeboat drill. There was no organization, no public-address system," he said.