By Theodore
Fischer, Washington Sidewalk
Titanic monument. The
world's only Titanic memorial statue, a female figure with arms
outstretched in eternal gratitude to the women-and-children-first spirit
of the Titanic men, is located beside the Washington Channel in Waterside
Park near Fourth and P streets S.W. The statue was sculpted in 1931 by
Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney and relocated here as part of a late-'60s
neighborhood revitalization scheme. On the anniversary of the April 15,
1912, disaster, the 20 male members of the Titanic Society don formal
attire and arrive by limousine to toast those who perished when the great
ship went down.
Titanic fountain. Maj. Archibald Willingham Butt was a military
aide to Presidents William Taft and Theodore Roosevelt. His friend Francis
Davis Millet was a distinguished artist whose work hangs in the
Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and London's Tate Gallery. After
the two men went down with the Titanic, their friends erected the Butt-Millet
Memorial Fountain, with a soldier and an artist etched into opposite
surfaces of a central shaft at the intersection of Executive Avenue and
Ellipse Drive N.W., between the Ellipse and the White House.
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Other
flicks. The
Titanic has been the subject of at least seven previous films. Titanic (1953),
a floating soap opera starring Barbara Stanwyck, Clifton Webb and a young
Robert Walker, and A Night to Remember (1958), a semidocumentary
based on a nonfiction bestseller, are available on video and are playing
during the new Titanic's opening weekend at the American Film
Institute cinema. Also on video: S.O.S. Titanic (1979), a
made-for-the-tube docudrama, and Raise the Titanic (1980), a Cold
War thriller. But forget about Saved From the Titanic, released a
month after the disaster and starring real-life survivor Dorothy Gibson.
Internet Movie Database says: "No copy of this film is known to
exist. Please check your attic."
Unsinkable models. Revell's R.M.S. Titanic, an 18½-inch
version at 1:570 scale, sells for $13. The basic Academy Minicraft R.M.S
Titanic, a 30¼-inch, 1:350 scale number, begins at $70, but
"photo-etch detail" sets – with railings, people and deck
chairs – nudge this baby into three figures. Available at Granddad's
Hobby Shop (5260-A Port Royal Rd., Springfield, VA, 703-426-0700) and Hobby
Works (12274 Rockville Pike, Rockville, MD, 301-468-6330).
Titanic's greatest hits. The original soundtrack of Titanic is
already available everywhere, and most stores also carry Titanic: A New
Musical, from the critically panned (but still running on Broadway)
winner of the 1997 Tony for best musical. It might take a trip to Tower
Records or another well-stocked store to track down Titanic: Music
as Heard on the Fateful Voyage, a Rhino compilation featuring
"Alexander's Ragtime Band," "Oh, You Beautiful Doll"
and, portentously, "I'd Like to Be Beside the Seaside."
Titanic books. Of the 200-odd Titanic books in print, some of the
most curious are Inside the Titanic: A Giant Cutaway Book by Ken
Marschall; Last Dinner on the Titanic: Menus and Recipes From the Great
Liner by Dana McCauley and Rick Archbold; Titanic: The Official
Story, reproductions of 18 documents; and Sherlock Holmes and the
Titanic Tragedy by William Seil. Find them at Borders Books
in D.C. and elsewhere.
Titanic video. The gift shop at National Geographic Society
Explorers Hall sells Secrets of the Titanic, an exploration
of "the watery grave of the ill-fated R.M.S. Titanic," singly
and as part of "Ghosts of the Deep: History's Greatest
Shipwrecks," a four-video set.
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