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COVEpod | Carganilla Online Variety Entertainment Podcast | Storytelling, Interviews, Poetry, Music, Arts & Inspiration
In the Carganilla Online Variety Entertainment Podcast, host Paul Carganilla [joined by his family and friends] offer a wide variety of entertainment offerings, including: music, poetry, storytelling, special guest interviews, dramatic readings, thought-provoking conversations, inspiration, and more!
Along with highlighting the work of established creators, this podcast celebrates the power of creativity, imagination, and inspiration. More than just an entertainment podcast, the COVE Podcast seeks to inspire its audience through performances and introspection from a community of like-minded individuals driven by the belief that dreams can become reality. Together, we cultivate a positive and supportive podcast community that entertains and empowers listeners to take bold steps toward their creative, professional, and personal life goals.
COVEpod | Carganilla Online Variety Entertainment Podcast | Storytelling, Interviews, Poetry, Music, Arts & Inspiration
Don Lynch | Titanic Historical Society Historian - Ghosts of the Abyss | COVEpod 32
Titanic Historical Society: Official Historian | Author of "Titanic - An Illustrated History" & "Ghosts of the Abyss" | James Cameron's Historian, Submersible-Mate, & 1997 Titanic Movie Cast Member | Really-Awesome Guy : DON LYNCH
As the Titanic's legacy continues to captivate hearts and minds over a century later, we have the honor of hosting Don Lynch, a historian with an unrivaled dedication to preserving the ship's story and its passengers' memories. Embarking from the shores of finance and sailing into the deep waters of historical research, Don shares the currents of his life that steered him toward becoming a cornerstone of the Titanic community. Our voyage takes a spectacular turn as we revisit the grandeur of James Cameron's "Titanic," a film where Don's expertise was instrumental in crafting an authentic portrayal of the bygone era. Imagine the awe of stepping onto the meticulously recreated sets in Mexico, feeling the texture of the past beneath your feet, and even appearing as an extra among the actors donning period costumes. Through Don's eyes, we peek behind the curtain of the film's production, contrasting the palpable craftsmanship of yesteryear to the virtual landscapes of contemporary cinema. It's a journey through time, evoking nostalgia for a world that once was.
Finally, as the echoes of history reverberate through our conversation, we surface the emotional depths that such tragedies cast upon our collective memory. Don takes us beneath the waves to the Titanic's final resting place, sharing the solemnity of that hallowed ground contrasted with the isolation felt during the 9/11 attacks. From societal lessons on decision-making in crisis to the maritime protocol of "women and children first," our discussion with Don Lynch is not merely a reflection on the past but a beacon, guiding us through the fog of history to glean wisdom for our own era. Join us, and let the tales of the Titanic stir your soul and challenge your perception of the indelible imprints historical events leave upon our world.
TITANIC HISTORICAL SOCIETY: https://titanichistoricalsociety.org/
EPISODE VIDEOS: www.covetube.com
COVE DIRECTORY: https://linktr.ee/covepod
COVE PATREON: www.patreon/covepodcast
CONTACT: covepod@gmail.com
POETRY PERFORMER: Craig Jackman
POETRY: “The Titanic" [ Wilbur D. Nesbit ]
VOICE-OVER INTRODUCTION: Jenette Goldstein ( Irish Mommy "Titanic", Janelle Voight "Terminator 2: Judgement Day", Private Vasquez "Aliens" )
SOCIAL MEDIA TEAM: Craig Jackman, Emily Thatcher, Christina Marie Bielen, Dary Mills, Amanda Benjamin
PATREON CURATORS: Jamie Carganilla, Emily Thatcher, The Faeryns, Charity Swanson, Krista Faith King, Kelsey B Gibson, Angelica Bollschweiler, Anna Giannavola, Gina Dobbs, Merrill Mielke, Susan Kuhn, Josefa Snider
INTRO MUSIC: “Papi Beat” [ KICKTRACKS ]
CREDITS MUSIC: “Fat Banana” [ KICKTRACKS ]
HOST, CREATOR, EXECUTIVE PRODUCER, CREATIVE DIRECTOR, EDITOR: Paul Carganilla
The thing I remember we didn't come up to the bow like they do in the movies. You know, we came up to the side and Jim just said Don, there's your Titanic. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Carganilla Online Variety Entertainment podcast. Here's your host, paul Carganilla.
Speaker 3:Hello and welcome to Cove. This is the online variety show in which we aim to both entertain and inspire both our podcast listeners and our YouTube viewers. There are a variety of entertainment art forms, music, poetry, storytelling and fun, exciting special guest interviews, travel blogs so much more. Speaking of special guests, we have one I'm truly honored to have on the show today.
Speaker 3:He, as anyone who listens to this podcast or knows me personally, knows that while we do touch on a lot of different things throughout this podcast, I keep coming back to Titanic because it is such a huge part of my life and I am, as anybody who knows, I'm a full-fledged Titanic and I'm just so fascinated with every aspect of both the movie and the history of it, and we have a, I would say, a current icon, historical icon, with us here today. I can't wait to meet and introduce everybody too, but before we get to our special guests, of course, we need to check in, say hello, bring the cart back in front of the horse and around the corner with producer Craig Jackman. Hello, producer Craig, Welcome. Hello everybody.
Speaker 2:Such a great day to see each and every one of you Not really, we'll see you if you're watching us on the YouTube Such a great day for you to see us.
Speaker 2:Exactly, and, paul, what a great day for us to dive into this subject again, and especially since you know, as we were kind of talking earlier before we started this podcast today, how much of a phenomenon Titanic has become over the last few years and how it's just ballooned, blossomed, just become an incredible thing since the movie Titanic came out and James Cameron and the fact that this gentleman that we're going to talk with is part of that phenomenon and helped to develop it and build it.
Speaker 3:Something really special about him is, you know, we've had special guests on this show. Even though we are still in season one, we've already talked to a few cast members Judy Preston and C way back in episode three, alexandra Boyd in December and just a couple weeks ago with Fanny Brett. We've gotten so many takes on the Titanic from the movie side, but he has been such a mainstay in just the pure historical aspect and relevance of Titanic's plays in history for many, many years. And I'll tell everybody a little bit more about him. His name is Don Lynch. He was born in Cordelaine, idaho. He was also so he was raised in Washington state, where he began researching Titanic while still in high school in Spokane, and in the five decades since high school he has traveled to museums and archives throughout the United States, canada, england and Ireland to conduct his research. He has met and interviewed 20 passengers from the Titanic as well as numerous relatives of survivors and victims, and for many years, many years, he has been the official historian for the Titanic Historical Society. In 1992, don wrote the text for the book Titanic and Illustrated History, which went on to spend 12 weeks on the New York Times bestseller. Director James Cameron hired Don as the historian for his movie Titanic and in the summer of 2001, hired him as a consultant on his Ghosts of the Abyss project, which was a huge, large format or IMAX, however you call it 3D trip back down to the Titanic in Russian submersible when they filmed it. It's really something spectacular. If you haven't seen it, check it out. But Don also wrote the text for the companion book to that film, that documentary Ghosts of the Abyss, and most recently was a contributor for James Cameron's book Exploring the Deep the Titanic Expeditions.
Speaker 3:Ladies and gentlemen, we have so much to talk to him about. Please join me in welcoming to the Carganilla Online Variety Entertainment podcast Don Lynch. Thank you very much. Hello, thank you so much for being here. It is an honor to have you. As we do with every guest, we're going to put you through the ringer here with a 60 second intro. We've read all the professional accolades that we can't wait to dive into, but we also want to know more about you as a human. So what can you tell us about Don Lynch, the person in 60 seconds or less? Are you ready to dive in?
Speaker 1:I guess you talked mostly about the Titanic stuff. Yes Gosh, am I human? Well, I graduated from Washington State University I was like a third generation of my family to go there, got a degree in finance and after about a year or so and spoke, I realized there were a lot better job opportunities in California and so I moved to Los Angeles, the greater LA area, and eventually landed in the West. I thought I wanted to be in banking but I eventually landed in government contracting and so had a long career in the finance and accounting area in the government contracting. I live right kind of in the heart of Los Angeles, just near downtown.
Speaker 1:I at one point decided I had to have a house. That existed when the Titanic existed. So I got a craftsman home, live in an area called West Adams, which is a great, great area. It's fantastic and just also had a lot of family in Southern California. So when I moved down here, suddenly, you know, I had a lot more family things going on because I had more relatives in Los Angeles than I didn't spoke in. But pretty much that's it. I haven't been working full time for several years now, just down to doing property management, which is not a full time job. So have time to, you know, socialize, whatever. Don't have any current Titanic projects that I can think of. A few articles I need to write for the Historical Society, for their magazine that I just haven't gotten to yet. But that's kind of where things are Tell us about.
Speaker 3:let's rewind it way back to as far as you can remember, your first, earliest memory of Titanic and connecting with it and getting hooked.
Speaker 1:Well, I remember as a child reading about it and encyclopedia you know we had those back then and I remember even saying that people continued to use the gymnasium and of course in my mind I thought of, like you know, a school gymnasium and I thought maybe they were like, you know, trapeze bars or something like that. You know, I had no idea what it looked like. And I remember in grade school seeing the 1953 Titanic on television on a Saturday afternoon. My brother said afterwards that I was a Gog over it, but I also remember on Monday going to school and all the kids were saying did you see Titanic on Saturday on TV? And so, you know, we really grabbed a lot of kids, not just me, but I, you know, have to admit.
Speaker 1:Finally, what really got me interested was when the Poseidon adventure came out, and I'd always been a nonfiction kind of kid. I always was reading about, you know, nonfiction things and some disasters I'm not say the San Francisco earthquake, whatever. You know. I'd find a topic, I'd like it and read more on it than move on to something else. And after seeing the Poseidon adventure, I wondered what real shipwrecks were like, and so I checked several books out of the library, one of which was A Night to Remember by Walter Lord, and that just grabbed me and I finished it and then I read it a second time. I just turned right around and read it all over again.
Speaker 1:And then very soon after that I wrote to Harland and Wolfe and then they recommended I joined the Titanic Historical Society and it just kind of snowballed from there.
Speaker 1:I started looking for survivors because I got every back issue of the, what they called a commutator, the magazine of the Historical Society, and they had always made survivors honorary members and they had been formed in 1963. And so after 50 years it should have been a lot more survivors than there were at that time. And so I knew they hadn't gone actively looking for them. And I did and found some who were just living quiet lives in retirement and then got involved more with the society in that respect, tracking down these people, whatever became of them, collecting their stories, actually got involved in organizing conventions for the Historical Society, and it just, you know, kind of snowballing from there. I kind of dug a hole I couldn't climb out of, and so it's been part of my life ever since. But I will have to say I've made some incredible friends. I've really met some wonderful, wonderful people through the Titanic and I've been very, very pleased with. You know all the things I've gotten out of it over the years.
Speaker 3:You mentioned the Historical Society and for anybody who doesn't know what that is, doesn't know the function of it or history of it, it was created in 1963, if I remember correctly, and there's a really fun story, or interesting story at least, over how it came to be.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the you know the 50th anniversary had just happened and New York Papers had interviewed several local survivors in the New York area, and I think it was Ed Commuter then reached out to one of them, a man named Walter Belford, and he had passed away, and so he tried to find out what had happened to his things having to do with the Titanic if he kept anything relative to it, and his landlady had thrown everything out when she cleaned out his apartment. He had no family, she threw everything away, and so that sort of spawned the historical society, so that they would have a repository for things like that, that they'd be able to collect things. The irony is that Walter Belford was a hoax. He had never been on the Titanic and so if he had anything, it probably wasn't genuine anyway. But that's his legacy for having been an imposter, is that he sort of spawned the creation of the Titanic Historical Society.
Speaker 3:Wow, and what does the society do?
Speaker 1:today. Well, today they still publish a magazine. It's not digital. We meet from time to time, but over the decades have supported innumerable documentaries. Books provided information. They have a small museum in the suburb of Springfield, massachusetts, called the Indian Orchard, but now they've actually been leasing things to the Titanic exhibits, museums, attractions, whatever you want to call them in Branson, missouri and Pigeon Forge, tennessee, and so you can see a lot of their things there, because people did donate things. They actually got from the family of one of the doctors from the Carpathia the life jacket that Mrs Astor was rescued in, because the doctor took it off of her and thought to himself this is Mrs Astor's, I'd better keep this. And then, 60 years later, whenever it was, the family donated it to the Historical Society. But they have discharged books that survivors, the crew members, had trying to think of, some of the other things that they've collected over the years, but also from people themselves and letters that were maybe mailed from the ship that sort of thing that the people then gave to the society in their old age versus maybe passing on to somebody else they're selling. And so they've got things that are museum quality, that they have on display in different locations.
Speaker 1:And then we used to do heritage tours back in the 90s and you're familiar with the actor, paul Rudd. His father was a member of the Historical Society. He was a Titanic guy and he had a business where he would put together tours and not just Titanic things, but he did, apparently, a great Civil War tour. He would do the Normandy beaches, things like that. And so he approached us in the early 90s about putting together a Titanic tour and did a number of those before he passed away and we were able to visit Harland and Wolfe when all the original buildings were still there. They've since been torn down.
Speaker 1:He had a knack for opening doors. Mike was great. He got us up into the tower of St Paul's Cathedral in London, which isn't open to the public, but they had a service after the Titanic went down and whenever they would do something like that, the bell ringers logged it in up in the tower. They've got logbooks and so we were able to see the logbooks, but they logged in the different numbers that the bell ringers had performed for the service and things like that. I mean it got us just all over and everywhere to the cemetery in Halifax, the cemeteries where a lot of the victims are buried, that sort of thing, and really wonderful, wonderful tours. And unfortunately Mike has passed away and so we don't have anybody doing that for us, but a lot of those things aren't available anymore. He got us into the Spanish embassy, which was Lord Perry's home in London. Well, they don't let anybody in anymore, but we need somebody like Mike who can really get doors to open again, and we don't quite have someone like that putting tourists together.
Speaker 3:But I know, just from researching and learning as much as I can, that you I mean I've heard you say that you're against your anti-salvage of the wreck but so all of the historical societies, artifacts are things that were passed on from survivors or came from, like Harlan and Wolfe, the shipyard where it was built.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, there are things that people actually maybe took off the ship with them in the lifeboats, that sort of thing, and nothing that was brought up from the wreck which couldn't be in the historical societies possession. Anyway, those things are not allowed to leave the company that has what they're called the salvers in possession. But my attitude is they weren't brought up in an archaeological fashion. They didn't document where exactly they came from, because where things landed when the ship broke up tells part of the story, forensically of how the ship broke up. And now we're missing those pieces. They're taken.
Speaker 1:It's like going to a murder site. You start picking up the bullets and just walking off with them without identifying where you dug them out of the wall or whether you picked them up off the floor, and so it hasn't been treated archaeologically and so we've lost a lot. And I will say, if you look at when Robert Ballard and that team found it way back in the 80s, if you look at the photos like he sent down camera sleds that just would skim above the bottom, and here are all these things right exactly where they landed, and it's just fantastic footage and we'll never see that again. We can't ever take footage like that again, and if any areas he missed, which are probably many, they'll never be photographed. Well now, because they've been picked over. And so I'm very much against salvage and I appreciate the fact that when Jim went down there he was able to explore the inside of the ship without having to worry about it having been picked over already. It was as it was left, whereas it's slowly decaying.
Speaker 3:Well, he had to find Cal's safe, of course.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, see that safe was still there.
Speaker 3:We'll talk more about the movie in just a minute, but we mentioned it in your bio. Any Titanic enthusiast has your book. It is a mainstay of any collection Titanic and Illustrated History. How did this come about from your beginnings, and did it come from just a matter of doing research for the historical society, or what was the In a way, yes, but the story is without stepping on toes.
Speaker 1:Ken Marshall, the artist, did a lot of work for Robert Ballard's Discovery of the Titanic and that book became a million bestseller, whatever. And Ken went back to the publishers and said really, you should do a book about the ship that starts from when it was an idea all the way through to present, not just about the discovery. And they said well, we've done the Titanic. It's could have been done to death. And then the editor admitted that they would go to these bookselling conventions and other publishers kept saying to them what are you doing your next Titanic book? So they came back and my memory is that they now thought it was their idea to do this book and not Ken's, even though he had already suggested it to him. But they came back and suggested doing this book that Ken would illustrate and such.
Speaker 1:And then, as the historian for the Historical Society, I was asked to write the text for it and that was the birth of Titanic and Illustrated History. And of course that was over 30 years ago now and, I'll admit it, it's outdated. We know things about the wreck now and obviously there are a few mistakes that crept in. I haven't read a book yet that didn't have mistakes, but it'd be great, and people are always asking when we're going to update it. But publishing isn't what it was 30 years ago, and so I don't think that's going to happen.
Speaker 3:It made me think too, when you were talking about the salvaging and the story to be told, like how technology has grown and we have these scans now that are they're altered. They're not what. It's not an accurate picture of how it actually hit and came to rest on the ocean floor due to the salvaging. Just a thought that I had. Now, as we go, I have to show you something and it is actually right here. I brought it. It's normally on my wall downstairs. I've mounted it. My wife it is a.
Speaker 3:It was an anniversary present for my wife this past year for our 15th anniversary. She found it and it was obviously salvaged from the movie set and the gentleman who sold it to her sent us this certificate of authenticity and he put your name on it and Judy's name on it and a photo. He included a photo of himself with you and Judy back in, I believe. Let's see it's dated December of 2000. And when I got this in May I had no idea that, like you know, between then and now I'd get to meet you and Judy, and I happily call Judy a friend now. But this gentleman's name was William J Miller and just thought that was super interesting that he sent us these photos, and here we are talking now.
Speaker 1:Great, yeah. I mean I can't certify the authenticity of that artifact, but I'm pleased my name was associated and that's great that is me in the photo. There's no doubt about it.
Speaker 3:That's what Judy said too. She's like I'm not really sure why I have my names on that, but okay, cool. So was it from the book and that kind of brought. How did you and James Cameron become connected and how did you become involved in his film?
Speaker 1:Well, you know I heard there was this movie coming. You know that he was working on this movie and I thought, you know, it never occurred to me that it would be so based on accuracy I can say I mean, I know people don't like the Jack and Rose story and Jack and Rose or fiction, and you know I don't have a problem with them at all. I mean I think it's fine.
Speaker 1:But you know you got to do what you got to do to get people into the theater and you know some people are such diehard fanatics that they don't care you know, they think that you know $200 million should have been spent to make a documentary. Not going to happen.
Speaker 1:But anyway, so I didn't think I would really be involved in it because I figured, OK, well, if there's a fictional storyline, then I, just as a sidebar. For years people would come to me and say, oh, I'm writing a fictional novel about the Titanic. Would you read it for accuracy? And it's like well, how do I know what you want to be accurate in what's fiction? You said it's a fictional novel, so what are you asking me to do? And so I kind of went in with that attitude. Well, you know, Ken was more excited than I was, we'll say at the time. And so he actually reached out to Jim's production company and he said well, Don Lynch and I have written this book and we're here in the Los Angeles area, if you know, you'd like us to be involved. And the woman he spoke with said we've been trying to find you.
Speaker 1:And so it turned out that Jim had used that book, Illustrated History, to pitch the movie to Peter Churnin, the head of Fox. He actually, you know, I'm honest, you know I'll believe it was the pictures, you know, because he's pitching a movie, he's not pitching, you know, an audiobook or something. But he laid it on the table in front of him and said I am going to put this on the big screen. It's going to be Romeo and Juliet on the Titanic, and so, which was pretty exciting to hear, that. And then you know they, you know all the production people were all given copies of the book and everything, and just so they'd be familiar with the story. And so, you know, Ken and I actually met with Jim very early, when the script wasn't even done, to go through it, because, just up front, how much accuracy are we going to have? And, for example, if I have Jack and Rose here and I need them to be here, you know, five minutes later can they go from point A to point B without having to climb eight flights of stairs and then run the length of the ship? That sort of thing, you know, just, and he's he's an incredibly brilliant guy and I'm sure he probably could have figured out just in five seconds by looking at a deck plan. But he wanted our input and so, you know, we just sat down with him and we went through what's called we call it treatment at the time and, you know, gave him, you know, our opinion, whatever and things and like, yes, this works, this doesn't that sort of thing, and of course it's still his to take and run with. It is whatever direction he saw fit. And then we were basically just welcome to come down to Mexico.
Speaker 1:They filmed early the Halifax scenes, the things on board, the Kaldish, the recovery, the present day stuff, but all of the 1912 scenes. You know. They built this huge set down in Mexico and we were given the run of the place. And I remember the first time I was down there and Jim said you can go anywhere you want. He said, just don't stand under a crane or in front of a moving vehicle. And of course I look back and think he probably should have said stay out of the ladies room. You know, but you know it just we could go wherever we wanted, you know. And we did have the run of the set and you know we did just. I mean, you know, kids in a candy store got to go down anytime we wanted.
Speaker 1:And you know, if they weren't filming we would just wander all over the ship and the sets because the interiors are not inside the ship. People think that they built one big, huge sort of replica ship with the insides inside it and they're not. The interiors were on sound stages, they weren't inside the ship replica. But you know, so we just had the best time and I, Ken, went down there before I did, and when he called me, I mean really I thought he was going to cry because the sets were so realistic, and so it really was exciting to to walk the sets and I really did feel like I was, you know, really, there. I guess you could say, and you know, I would walk on the boat deck and I would think, well, gosh, there is the doorway that Mrs Snyder told me she came out of when she came up with her husband to go to the boats, and you know, and here's the lifeboat that you had, Haysman said that she was in.
Speaker 1:And then, when I got in the dining room set for the first time, and I just looked around and I was thinking, I wonder where the Strauss is set and I wonder where the Clarks set, and then I had to stop and say, well, they weren't here ever. You know, I had to remind myself that I'm actually not there, but it was so spot on perfect, and so I just was overwhelmed. It was just, you know, fantastic that we could go down there and be a part of that. And then, you know, we had the opportunity to come down and be extras and Ed and Karen Commuta being the founder of this historical society, they flew out because, you know, they kind of had an idea, I think, that they would just have Ken and me in the background, playing cards in the smoking room, and you couldn't guarantee what day they'd be filming in interior, because if the weather was great, they'd be doing exterior shots and they might plan to do interior. And then suddenly the sun's out, it's perfect, and it's like well, we're not doing interior scenes, we're going to do these scenes. And so somebody finally said you just need to plant yourself for a week and we'll get you in something.
Speaker 1:And so, and Ken wasn't available, he couldn't take a whole week off of his schedule, but I did, and it was actually Thanksgiving week, so I didn't have to miss too much work and I went down and I, you know, got suited up and almost immediately they said go, stand next to that little boy.
Speaker 1:And I did and they said you look like you could be his father, Go up on deck. And it turned out. It was the scene where Jim reproduced one of the father brown photos. There was a Jesuit student, Francis Brown, who later became a priest who was on board only as far as Ireland, and he brought his camera and took several photos that are famous today, and one of them is of this little boy spinning atop while his father and a few other people look on. And Jim was going to reproduce, and I knew he was going to reproduce it. You know, in the movie it was in the script. I didn't realize that's what they were filming that day, and so I got to be Frederick Spedden and be the father of the little boy spinning the top.
Speaker 3:That's so neat. Yeah, I remember it's a scene for anyone listening where Jack hops up onto the deck where he's not supposed to be and steals the jacket and there's the two men standing with the boy spinning the top. And how surreal did it feel to be. I mean, I'm sure you saw the photo many, many times before playing the role.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, I'd met the Spedden family. I mean, I, you know, so it's that was. You know, when people think it was deliberate and it wasn't, and even Jim was surprised and we didn't realize at the time. You know, he made the other gentleman just be Mr Ryerson, just pulled a name off the passenger list and at the time I knew the granddaughter of Edward Crosby and she'd actually been in London at the time. She was old enough that she was alive at the time of the Titanic disaster and was almost a passenger.
Speaker 1:And one day she just said you know, my grandfather was photographed on the Titanic and she's like she never said that before. And I said, really she said, oh yeah, it appeared in papers at the time and you know you could tell it was him because he was sort of a hunchback, he'd had an injury in the Civil War. Well, that's who the other person in the photo was. And if she had said that months earlier we would have corrected the script and we would have had the right identity for that man. But anyway, so I knew basically everybody in the photo. I met their families and so it was really exciting to be in that scene. That was really wonderful. I did have another scene, but it got cut, so that was okay.
Speaker 3:The cutting room floor. Yeah, so you mentioned the sets and the interior sets. I just know from being a huge like, having a background in filmmaking and being a huge fan of the film. These weren't like, hey, this room is in this soundstage, this room is in this soundstage. These were massive, multi-floored recreations in huge sound stages. What was it like? Walking the halls, going up and down the stairs of the ship that you had studied your entire life and seen only pictures of black and white photos, or pictures of it on the bottom of the ocean? What was that feeling?
Speaker 1:It really was an incredible feeling and you did feel you were there. And you know some of the rooms were on different sound stages, for example the gymnasium, because it really didn't connect to any other room, so it didn't matter. But you could literally walk out of Rosa's Suite, down the corridor, down the grand staircase, through the reception room and into the dining room and never know you were on a set, because all the walls had been built, everything was there and that way they could film from any angle. And it was heartbreaking when they were filming because if they needed to get a camera up above they'd cut a hole in the ceiling or something, and also the ventilation was very poor. It was Mexico and so it was hot. And I remember for some of the dining room scenes, you know they had huge blowers, you know, and they had to cut holes in the walls to get air in just to make them comfortable, because you couldn't have everybody sitting there sweating and supposedly April in North Atlantic. But up until then it was fantastic. And of course you know I had to descend the grand staircase and run back up again and descend it a few times just through the feeling of it, and but I remember standing there and it was just perfect and just looking around and thinking gosh, and then suddenly a bell rang and all the extras were coming in for the dining room scene, where they all sit around the big table and had dinner, and suddenly all these people in costume were flooding into the reception room and I was like, oh my gosh, the passengers are arriving for dinner.
Speaker 1:And when everybody's in costume and I found that when I was suited up as an extra, when you're all dressed like in 1912, it feels normal. You don't feel like you're dressed for another period because everybody around you is dressed the same way, and it just felt right. I guess it's like today, I mean, we all dress like it's 2024. And 20 years from now we'll all dress like it's 2044. And we'll forget that it seemed normal 20 years earlier that we looked like this and so that's just how it was. I mean it just seemed perfectly normal and right. I mean I could go on about the clothes, because I will say clothes were different.
Speaker 1:They gave me these. Well, they gave me this outfit and I didn't even know how to tie a tie, you know, genuinely or even fasten the collar, you know, because they're separate collars and I was being the somewhat special person, I got to have like a private dressing room which was just a little cubicle of cloth. And then, you know, and they gave me a dresser, you know William, who probably didn't like me because you know I needed his help and he had plenty of other people to help. But you know, when I put on the pants, I said, well, I think the legs are too long, and they were like, no, pull them up. And you know, they came up halfway up your chest and that's where pants were worn then. And then you wore a vest over it.
Speaker 1:So today, of course, we wear pants as far up as our waist. Back then they wore them higher for whatever reason. And then you know, maybe I can't remember, I must have had suspenders or something, but then you know you had a vest over it, so it doesn't really show. And so then, of course, when I pulled them up that far, the legs are fine. And then you know the coat and everything over it. But it just seemed right, you know, it just worked out.
Speaker 3:So much of character building and world building is really what we're wearing, and we talk about that as actors a lot, you know, as when you're playing a role and you put on your character's clothes like it does something internally to you Because it creates a world. And yeah, I can imagine how on set, it was the crew members that seemed like they were dressed funny.
Speaker 1:Well, it's so funny today and because filmmaking has come so far in 25 years, and today Jim particularly because he's always cutting edge would not have built those sets. You know, today it'd be like with Avatar. Avatar is almost exclusively green screen, I believe and imagine acting where you can't see your surroundings and you're not in costume, and yet you have to act a scene. And I have to give actors credit today, because if you can work on Avatar, you know you are a real actor. I mean, it blows me away. You know how far filmmaking has come, that you don't even have to do all the sets and the costumes, it'll all be added later. And so I think Titanic was like the last real epic movie that will ever have those kinds of sets.
Speaker 3:I agree 100%. I spent last summer, or was it two summers ago now. My daughter's an actress and she was in the most recent Robert Rodriguez movie. He made all the Spy Kids movies. He just made a new one for Netflix, and so we're on set the whole summer and he's got these huge studios filled with green screens for these movies. And I remember one day she and her co-star were doing the scene where they're reacting to the green screen, something's coming at them, and between takes, robert gave them direction and Everly my daughter asked what are we reacting to? And I just thought isn't that interesting Like he's like look scared, look scared. And she's like what is it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. What's my motivation? Yeah.
Speaker 3:I heard from Star Wars actors from when they did the reboot back in the late 90s when I was in high school that they felt like it kind of made them better actors because they had to imagine everything and it was their imagination that was giving them the surroundings. But I mean, how could you get a more authentic performance than standing on the Titanic when water is coming in and all these people? I just can't, yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, we did when we did Ghost of the Abyss, the 3D IMAX large format film, and we did a lot of that green screen we didn't have because we were the ghosts and so we didn't have all the sets or whatever. But even then and it was all done with extras and even then some of the ladies were crying when they were imagining looking back at the ship sinking with their loved ones on board everything. And people really got into it. I guess you could say who wouldn't Like on Titanic one time. There's the one scene which is based on a real situation where Lifeboat 13 drifts underneath Lifeboat 15 as it's coming down and of course they start screaming stop lowering. They thought it was Lifeboat 14. They're screaming but stop lowering. And they stopped.
Speaker 1:And Jim was like why did you just stop lowering? They said, well, they said to and they were so convincing, even though they were extras. And Jim even thought imagine extras who can act Because they in that boat were so convincing and screaming in terror that this boat was about to crush them that the extras on deck and I don't know what you call them they were. I mean, I don't imagine they have an extra, extra lowering the boat. They'd be more engineering type people, or whatever you call them, the special not special effects, but stunt people, gramps, but anyway. But they actually believed it. They heard others yelling and screaming and they stopped lowering Even though the camera was still rolling and nobody had said cut. So you know, it does help, I think, in a situation like that to have the set there, especially if you're not a professional actor. It makes it easier to envision it when you're not used to acting.
Speaker 3:Alexandra Boyd's movie Ship of Dreams, titanic movie diaries has a lot of the actors reading their diaries and Rebecca Klingler, the mother at Stern, said one of her quotes was suddenly the screams that were coming out of me were my own. They weren't my characters anymore because they were in just such an intense situation. She, the actress, was screaming. Yes, got to help the performance let's talk real quick about. You mentioned Ghost of the Abyss, the movie that you worked with. The follow up movie was about six or seven years after that. You filmed Titanic and you got to go down to see it. Tell us about that.
Speaker 1:Well, august 20, august 17th, August 27th, let me think. Oh yeah, august 27th, 2001 was my first dive and Jim took me down there. I was just eye candy because basically you've got the pilot and the photographer and there's one extra seat because, you know, the two people as passengers can go down in these Russian submersibles. And Jim took me down along and you know it, it was, I got. Well, I will say I always tell the story that I really was nervous. I was very, very nervous about this and you know what happens, what happens, and I even told someone on, you know the Keldish, one of the production people. I said I've never been claustrophobic in my life. What happens if I get to the bottom of the ocean and I have a panic attack? And he honestly said the Russians keep a really big wrench in the submersible because you can't have a panic attack and start thrashing around. He said they would just club you over the head and say well, that's comforting. And I will say it's also comforting to know and it's, I mean, it's tragic to say this now after what happened this last year, but if there's even the tiniest pinhole, the thing will implode and there's, you don't even know what happened, it's over in an instant, there's no suffering and that actually comforting. And so and then, but I can, you know bill packs and was nervous about going down and he said he told glorious story, he was going to do this and she went off about how he had no business going down at the bottom of the ocean when he had young children at home and blah, blah, blah, and so it's been an action movies and he's nervous. And finally, when I got into the submersible and looked around and all I thought, oh okay, this is where I'm gonna be for the rest of the day. And I realized what was making me nervous was I just didn't know what it looked like. I didn't even I couldn't Picture the inside of the submersible.
Speaker 1:Once I got inside, looked around, it's like okay, and you know the first dive, I made it point not to look at the hatch because in my mind, that separates me from death, even though, realistically, everything around you separate you from death. Right, and there wasn't a lot of room because a lot of camera equipment there were. You know, even little boy called lipstick cameras are like little tiny cameras pointing at us. So you know you don't want to use the pee bottle, unless you've covered up the camera. But anyway, and I didn't have to, like you know, you know you endurance test but Went down, had spectacular time and just you only get to look out of a port hole and it's, you know, very small.
Speaker 1:The pilot gets the bigger port hole and the side of the submersible is so thick you can't look at an angle, you only look straight out. And I kept wanting to look at the camera monitors, because the cameras mounted, mounted outside the submersible, were panning and tilting and seeing all kinds of stuff and I had to keep reminding myself don't? You can look at those later, you can see all the footage later. Look out the portal and the thing I remember we didn't come up to the bow like they do in the movies, you know. We came up to the side and Jim just said Don, there's your Titanic. And we started rising up the side and I've always studied the story, I studied what happened.
Speaker 1:I'm not the visual historian like Ken Marshall where he's painted the ship and done. You know, all these illustrations and paintings and those, every port hole and the circumference and every you know rivet. And we're rising up the side and I knew where I was and it was like, oh my gosh, I knew the ship better than I thought. After all these years studying it, I didn't realize I knew what this was like. Here we are, this is like D deck, this is where the reception room is, and then, you know, here's C deck, which means that that's the Strauss's suites, then those windows there, which means that then of course we have the cardezas above that. And you know, I knew who was behind who rooms are behind those port holes, and so I knew it better than I thought. I remember it being more colorful down there than it even appears on film, and I don't know why that is. It just struck me the greens are more vivid. Anything that corrosion on it, whatever, just things like that, were more vivid.
Speaker 1:And so we did a bunch of filming and but this little warning light kept going off, and, and so you know to finally said you know, don't worry.
Speaker 1:He said it's a hydraulic issue, we're not in danger. And I said well, I soon, if we were, you would have stopped filming. And he just said Don't be so sure. And so he's, he was kidding around, but finally reached the point where I think they decided just have to go back, because you know the Russian pilot decides Whether you stay down any longer or not. You know if he decides your dive is over, that he's in charge. And so I can't remember exactly off the top of my head, but I think it's like an eight hour dive or something, and it's two hours to get down and two hours to get back, and so he must have been at least four hours down there, maybe longer, and then my next dive we were in the second year, mere two, and it was Ken and me and a different pilot, and that was on nine eleven, and so we left the surface and we're on our way down and Jim's brother, john David Cameron he was part of the expedition.
Speaker 1:He I say radio, because it's all acoustic. There is no radio underwater, you can't transmit radio waves underwater, but you can transmit acoustically. And so he said something that was sort of a code. He was in security, in the military, and so he had this code worked out for the family in case there was ever a national emergency, and, and you know, we could hear a world trade and something else. And and then finally Jim answered back and said I don't know what you're saying, and so he didn't have it memorized. And so then he just said there's been a terrorist attack on the world trade center and all flights are grounded.
Speaker 1:And we thought that time, you know, a few years earlier, when somebody set off a bomb in the parking structure, and so we couldn't reconcile why all the flights were grounded, what does that have to do with it? And so we continued on our dive, and this was a rescue dive. We had lost one of the robotic cameras inside the reception area, and so we gun back now and Jim, and mere one, was going to try to hook the thing with just a close hook, because we didn't have manipulative arms that could reach inside the ship. He was just going to send in the other camera with a little hook and try to hook it, and he did and we're providing lighting. So he kept motoring up the side of the Titanic and then shining these bright lights in the D deck doorway as we passed. And then we go back and do it over and over, which took a lot of juice, you know. It took a lot of electricity for the lights as well as motoring around. And so the thing was rescued, everybody was happy, we're excited. And then we reached about 50% of power.
Speaker 1:So I think that dive was about nine hours that day, and at that point, when you reach 50%, the Russians say no more. You know, they're very careful, you know they're, it's all cautious. It's great having two submersibles. If one of them got stuck, the other one could come and help you out. But you know they're very careful and they don't, you know, play games with lives. And so it was like, ok, we have to go back.
Speaker 1:And so we got back up, and when we got to the surface, you know we had, you know we'd forgotten all about the you know message. We talked about it briefly on the way back up, saying I wonder what happened Now, was it? But we were so excited that we rescued this robotic camera that we needed so much for all this filming and we got to the top and of course he asked us, you know, now it went and all that. We were all very excited and then after about 10 minutes built, paxton broke it to us what had happened that day. So that was, you know, really an awful you know thing, obviously for everybody. But I always look back because I the feeling I had that day was that I had left the surface of the earth To go to the bottom of the ocean and when I came back I came back to a different planet. It wasn't the same earth I knew when I left that morning. It was a completely different planet and you couldn't go back again. You know you can't get back in the submersible and go back to the one you left. And so it was just, you know, of course it was horrible for everybody.
Speaker 1:And then here we were way out there and you know, you know, some people, you know, I think, had relatives on things. I actually had a distant relative on one of the planes and but I had, you know, relatives who worked in the World Trade Center and I had a relative who worked in the Pentagon. And Finally I realized I could get ahold of my aunt, something. Her phone number popped in my head and we had a land. We had not a landline, we had one dedicated line where you could dial anywhere, and so, you know, cell phones weren't as common then, right, and I was able to call her and she was able to tell me that everybody was fine and all that so. But it was just and I've since been told that that day there were three people in outer space and six people at the bottom of the ocean and that were considered among the nine most remote people in the world on 9-11. So it's just kind of a Little thing you can hang your hat on, I guess.
Speaker 1:So that that was that experience that day, but but it was as far as diving on the Titanic, like I said, it was exciting to be able to rescue the bot and everything. And On one of the dives I can't remember which one I kept thinking about the survivors, you know it's like, oh my gosh, this is where so-and-so was and this is so-and-so and you know whatever. And then on the other dive, I kept thinking about the victims. It's like, okay, here's what the band played and here's where mr Mrs Strauss, you know, didn't get into a lifeboat that sort of thing, and so kind of each, each group of people got their due on my two dives, and so that that was.
Speaker 1:That whole expedition was incredible. I We'd never explored the interior, it hadn't really been explored in detail, nobody'd ever been able to send robotic cameras so deep into the ship before and it. It was just Phenomenal to go out there not knowing what we were gonna find, and I always likened it like going to Skull Island, because we heard of this great ape called Kong and that we were off to find it. You know, it felt like that, I mean. And then, of course, going back to St John's, newfoundland, after 9-11, because we'd go back every so many weeks Just to, you know, refuel, get new food, whatever. And now suddenly the whole city is just packed with people from all these Grounded flights and they were sleeping in the hallways in the hotels and things like that, and they're all being fed at the gym in the high school and it was just, you know, a whole different town, different world, everything.
Speaker 3:Well, we're running up against the clock, but I know you've said so many times, like you're, what fascinates you most. Of course you, you will know you will forget more about the, the ship, the Titanic, than I'll ever know, but you're more interested in the people, and the people stories is is really what sticks with you. Before we wrap up, can you tell us one, or what is your? What is the favorite lesson that you've learned from talking to survivors? Or the thing that just sticks with you the most?
Speaker 1:Well, gosh, off the top of my head. It's hard to say I I Usually quote Edwina trout because she was the oldest one I knew. She was 27 at the time. She was kind of in command of her own destiny. She was traveling alone, she bought her own ticket, that sort of thing, and, and the one thing that pops into my head and I've shared this a lot is you know, ken, and I asked her one time why did you wait until the very last lifeboat? And she said well, back then, when a ship sank, you died.
Speaker 1:And so we have to remember. We always say why didn't that person get into a lifeboat and why didn't they? You know Whatever? And we have to remember, they didn't know that if you got into a lifeboat, you would be rescued. We know that we have 2020 hindsight. We know that everybody who got into a lifeboat survived. They had no idea that that was going to be true. And so here was a single girl. No one was dependent upon her, she made peace with it, she was ready to go down with the ship, and then someone walked up with a baby and asked her to save the baby, and she knew the only way that could happen was that she got into a boat, so she got into the very last lifeboat and then lived under the 73 years. But that that's kind of a lesson I use a lot is that, you know, we, we have to remember that we have 2020 hindsight, when we're studying the Titanic. And they didn't yeah.
Speaker 3:I was interested In the women and children first thing, where that came from, and so I researched it one day and, as I understand it, the, the ocean was so well respected by men that it was understood. Men understood if you're going to get on a ship, if it sinks you're gonna die, and and taking women and children on that ship meant you're responsible for them and they. They have no business out there, and so if the ship goes down, you need to save them first. Is that how you understand it?
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that it originated. I can't remember the name of the shipwreck, but there was a shipwreck, and I think in the 1890s, 1880s, 1890s if I heard the name, I'd know. But when it went down that was the first one where I guess they had enough time to really have the men step aside and let the women and children go first and In it, you know, when you think of that, you know, of course children shouldn't be expected to fend for themselves and Women, in a sense, were the weaker sex and of course, if you put them in a dress that goes all the way to the floor, you know they're not as limber, and so you know it. It made sense, but it wasn't worldwide.
Speaker 1:And Ruth Becker, who was coming from India, her father Stayed behind. He couldn't, he couldn't come on the Titanic. They you couldn't get a furlough from being a minister and so he didn't get to come with his family, which saved his life, and you know, she and her siblings and her mother were rescued. But he told them afterwards that all of a sudden, this wave swept over India because of course, you know, men are the dominant sex in India and women were second-class citizens and they'd never heard of women first. And Suddenly, when they heard about the Titanic disaster, at least for a while there, there was this sort of attitude that you know you take care of the woman first. Now in India, and I don't think it lasted forever, but that was the the effect the Titanic had on the world at the time.
Speaker 3:Wow. Well, you are a legend in my mind and I am so honored that you sat down with us and spent some time with us. I am very grateful for it, for your time and for joining us here on cove podcast. Thank you so much, john. Thank you this has been fun All right. Ladies and gentlemen at home, please give it up. For mr the legend, I should say Don.
Speaker 2:Wow, the first-hand knowledge of the I mean in a sense now, of course, in our lifetime, of the unveiling of this huge story that took took place so many years ago and he was right there and To go down that far in the ocean. I mean we've seen movies about it, but to actually have someone go down and experience what it's like, I mean that is incredible. Voyage to the bottom of the sea, the abyss these are movies that just you know, in a sense celebrate this, or even more recently, aquaman, but it's not as intense as when you, when you're taking a Submarine or a bath. A scap, I think, is what they would call those types of Vessels that would go down that far.
Speaker 3:I I just kept thinking about, like the blessings we always say on this podcast.
Speaker 3:You know and and you know people preach it all the time but when you follow your heart and Doors, doors will open and a lot of times you know, based on what's happening in your life. You can't always dedicate yourself or apply yourself to your passion or your heart's fire, but when you see that happen in life, like this man Was intrigued by the Titanic, did all this research by it, became an expert, wrote a book and then he's he gets free, run of the set. When James Cameron recreates the Titanic to be able to explore that and see the things you've been reading about, and for so long, and then, on top of that too, then five years later, be able to, it just blew my mind. He's telling the story of going down to the bottom of the ocean and Viewing the Titanic with your bare eyes through a porthole, sitting next to James Cameron, who lit this Titanic flame. What an amazing and charmed Existence to be able to, when that's your passion, to be able to have both of those experiences in your life.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, and like you when you hear his description of actually seeing it, mmm you.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I was able to see the big piece. Did the whole thing about it on a previous episode, but seeing it recovered from the bottom of the ocean is already like as a gut punch. You feel it when you're in the room. You feel the soul of the Titanic and everyone who died on board. But I can't imagine seeing it on the bottom of the ocean, and I say in its entirety, but as much as you can see out of a porthole this big so you don't die.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and you can imagine how powerful that is, and given the power of the sea, and especially at that time, because I found a really neat poem from an American poet by the name of Wilbur D Nesbitt and it's about the Titanic and it brings up some interesting points about it's not nice to fool with mother nature.
Speaker 3:But very Titan appropriate. What's the title?
Speaker 2:It is called the Titanic.
Speaker 3:Oh well, ladies and gentlemen at home, it is my pleasure to introduce pretty Sir Craig Jackman's interpretation of the poem the Titanic, written by Wilbur D Nesbitt.
Speaker 2:Now, this was the work of the hand of man, the dream of a prideful brain that the wrath that sleeps in the rolling deep might waken to strengthen vain. We build it, a ship that was one of might. We build it at staunch and strong. We forged its keel to its ribs of steel. We fashioned it wide and long. We said there was not that might humble it, no power in sea or sky, and it broke as a crumb, twixed finger and thumb when the ocean made reply.
Speaker 2:There were long decks where the gay folks strolled and the wake was a white, white foam and the jewels gleamed and the people dreamed of the strength that bear them home. There were billows high that the bowcliffed flair and as scornfully tossed aside. For the ship was great and it hastened straight with no halting for wind or tide. We said there was not that might bid it pause, no power in wind or wave, but an echoing surge is the only dirge that is murmured above its grave.
Speaker 2:Now the sea is deep and the sea is strange and is jealous of all men do, and it takes its toll as its billows roll and it answers with wreck and hue. It has been unchanged since the birth of time and it palsies the hand of man, though he work in pride and with faith beside in his cunning toil and plan. We said of the ship it would keep its course and mock at the sky and sea. Then a swift caught breath and the call of death in a mocking and strident key. Now, this was the work of the hand of man, a mighty and wondrous thing. And we told the sea it no more might be over man and his works the king. We made it as strong as hundred ships that threaded the seas of yore and it lies today when the long swells play through the wrecks on the ocean floor. We said there was not, that might humble it, no power in sea or sky. And it broke as a crumb, twist, finger and thumb when the ocean made reply.
Speaker 3:I am so thankful for our entire Patreon community. If you haven't checked it out yet, head over to patreoncom. See all the extras you can get for becoming a backer for just $3 a month. There's extra bonus episodes each month and so much more. To check out Patreoncom. And, as I am blessed to do every month, I want to give a big shout out of thanks to our Patreon cove curators Angelica Balschweiler, ana Ginovola, charity Swanson, emily Thatcher, gina Dobbs, jamie Carganilla, josepha Snyder, kelsey Blaine Gibson, krista King, meryl Milky, the Farons, susan Kuhn. I appreciate you all so much for helping this show. Continue to go and continue to grow. Love. You all. Have a great week. We'll see you next Tuesday.
