White Star Line/RMS Olympic fan

[Captainplaid]

Hi folk's it's Michael in Canada,
I truly hope you all won't get to upset by me posting this here on the forum? I know it has nothing to do with any of our subjects or topics? But it's a real passion of mine to study and collect thing's related the "White Star Line" and the RMS Olympic. A hard part for me as a collector is i am living in Canada when the subject of my study was in England primarily? As most of you my Forum friends are living in the U.K/England i just wanted to ask of you? If in your daily travels you see something or know of someone whom does? Could you please help me by keeping an eye out i would really appreciate it heck even stories from your families would be amazing and sooooo appreciated?

Best of regards from Michael Mangold

 

[w8cmp]

I'm a big Titanic fan, and have a pretty good library of books on the ship and her sisters. I am also working on a 1:400 model with full etched brass / fibre optic lighting which I may eventually complete when I retire !

The ships fascinate me...

Chris

 

[steve36uk]

Same here-always been fascinated by Titanic and her sister.and the whole White Star history.

 

[paulcarson]

Mike, there is a Hotel not far from where I live - Alnwick that has the dining room from the Olympic , it was apparently removed just before it was scrapped. ( according to my Dad who is a big enthusiast of that kind of thing. ) The Hotel is callled the White Swan. Not sure if they have a website but my Dad says that he remembers that the dining room was all dark stained wood . ( He used to be a drummer in a band when I was younger and played there several times )

found this, it may help you ?

http://thewhiteswan.classiclodges.co.uk/

 

[Captainplaid]

I'm a big Titanic fan, and have a pretty good library of books on the ship and her sisters. I am also working on a 1:400 model with full etched brass / fibre optic lighting which I may eventually complete when I retire !

The ships fascinate me...

Chris

Hi Chris, gosh glad your not upset by me posting this topic here? Oh cool your a Fan as well, they were indeed Grand ladies of the Seas. I only wish they would have not scrapped RMS Olympic and saved her, can you imagine taking a ships tour of her today??
Walking down the Grand staircase sitting in the smoking room with a brandy? Everything was sold at action. A few years back a fellow went to a paint factory on the back roads of England. When he got inside he marvelled at the original floor tiles and part of the Grand staircase with matching light fitting's. The staff cafe had it's walls floor and ceiling all out fitted with original panels from the Olympic. When the floor was lifted under was other layers of original tiles plus on the second floor it was made of rows upon rows of wooden decking used on the walk areas outside.

Ohhhh i love History
Mike

 

[Captainplaid]

Mike, there is a Hotel not far from where I live - Alnwick that has the dining room from the Olympic , it was apparently removed just before it was scrapped. ( according to my Dad who is a big enthusiast of that kind of thing. ) The Hotel is callled the White Swan. Not sure if they have a website but my Dad says that he remembers that the dining room was all dark stained wood . ( He used to be a drummer in a band when I was younger and played there several times )

found this, it may help you ?

http://thewhiteswan.classiclodges.co.uk/

Ohh cool Paul, yes i do know of this Hotel and your soo right it indeed had been outfitted with original panels off of the RMS Olympic along with wall sconces. I love hearing about this and your Dad playing there wowwww. So now it all makes sense as the cruise ship Celebrity reported that is has that entire room now on there ship?
Wild thank you Paul.

 

[CR]

Long before the James Cameron take on Titanic, I was a Titanic enthusiast, and by association, an enthusiast of her sisters Olympic & Britannic. That hotel where Olympic's woodwork ended up was mentioned (and photographed) in at least a couple of the many books I own about the ships. I've not heard any recent news about the stuff being placed in another ship, though. I'd think it would be cheaper & safer to replicate the original, but I suppose that wouldn't be as big a draw for people. Interesting.
By the way, if you didn't already know, I live in the US, so I'm afraid I can't help you with any personal history related to this topic. I just wanted to chime in about my interest!

 

[seaview]

Hi Chris

about 15 years back i went along to the Titanic exhibition , i recall looking at some of the Titanics hull ,and objects brought up from the sea bed and thinking my god , there were loads of things on show , but a bench seat ,and port hole window , and the captains wheel were the real eye openers ,

pete

 

[CR]

Ah! I, too, had seen the Titanic artifact exhibit when it was in Seattle, WA. I was struck by the mundaneness of the artifacts; had they not been recovered from the ocean floor site of one of the most famous shipwrecks in history, none of those things would have even been around today, unless by chance they'd ended up in someone's attic for several decades. Even the portion of Titanic's hull, had the ship not sank, would have fallen under the scrapper's torch around the time Olympic was scrapped. Just an interesting observation, I guess... by being lost, the items now have far more significance after having been found. Something to think about when we use all of our daily-taken-for-granted things, yes?. :think:

 

[oshvision]

Check out my paper model

HMS Brittanic in paper!

 

[oshvision]

oh.. and another, this is one of the Olympic:

 

[DX-SFX]

See! Cameron could've spent far less on effects than he did.

 

[scifimodelfan]

Hi Michael, I to have been a White Star, Titanic, Olympic and Britanic fan ever since I was around seven. I am always on the hunt for finds. I will keep my eyes open for you. It was not as hard as it is now ever since Titanic came out. I have quite a few items in my own collection. Such as, models, Movie props from titanic, plates, silverware, Lifebelts, Lobby cards from Titanic, A Night to Remember, Raise the Titanic, post cards of all the ships, original smoking room tile from Harland and Wolf, books from 1912, newspapers from 1912 and a lot of other items.

 

[Maj. John Sheppard]

I've been facinated with the Titanic and other White Star Line ships ever since I read Clive Cussler's "Raise the Titanic" back when I was a kid. I even found a website link showing some recent photos of the large-scale model they used for filming the movie version.

http://titanic-model.com/models/raise_the_titanic_movie_model/index.shtml

I also have been working on a pair of Academy 1/350 scale Titanic models over the years. Can't wait to get at least one of them finished.

 

[copernicus]

The White Swan pub in Alnwick still has the fittings from the Olympic in its dining room. They also host "Titanic" dinner parties where guests are encouraged to come in period dress and they serve food from the menus that were on the Titanic when it sailed. They also have guest nights where Titanic experts come and give lectures on the Titanic and her sister ships. I'm not sure if they allow people just to go and photograph the room but I will ask and if they do, will post some pictures on this thread. May be a few days before I get time to go up there.I know that people from Cameron's Titanic picture did attend and take photos and measurements of the fittings.

 

[steve36uk]

Presumably the Titanic dinners don't end end with spending a night adrift in the North Sea in a lifeboat?

 

[healvis]

I think Tony James the owner of Comet Miniatures is a big Titanic enthusiast. He always seems only to happy to talk and give information to people who are interested.

 

[Jade Falcon]

I'm a Titanic fan as well, but also a general fan of the 'old style' of Cruise Liners right up to the QE2, the SS United States and the SS France (sadly now scrapped). I don't think todays ships, and yes I include the Queen Mary 2 in this have the granduer in them that the old ladies do. The modern creations look more like glass floating apartment blocks.

Two good books on the White Star Line are here

Titanic:Triumph and Tragedy

[ame]http://www.amazon.co.uk/22Titanic-22-Triumph-John-P-Eaton/dp/185260493X/ref=sr_1_78?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1269010839&sr=1-78[/ame]

Titanic and her sister ships

[ame]http://www.amazon.co.uk/Titanic-Her-Sisters-Olympic-Britannic/dp/1571451757/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1269011045&sr=1-1-spell[/ame]

 

[CR]

France was scrapped? I thought it was converted to the cruise liner Norway, running in the Caribbean... it's colours were changed from black, white & red to blue & white, and it had a couple of excursion launches fitted to its bow to ferry passengers to & from ports, as the waters in the caribbean ports-of-call were too shallow for the big ship's draught.

Or did you mean the Ile de France, which was not only scrapped, but in the process, was used as the part of a fictional sinking ocean liner in the 1960's film The Last Voyage?

Side trivia for the uninitiated: Ile de France also had participated in the rescue of several hundred passengers from the stricken Italian liner Andrea Doria.


By the way, I agree that today's ships are fairly ugly; floating bricks is what I call them. Granted, when you're inside the ship, I guess you don't care what the outside looks like. But ships like the Normandie managed to have lavish interiors while still looking ship-like on the outside. I'd read an anecdote about a young boy travelling on that ship who remarked "where's the ship?" because it felt to him like he was simply in a land-based hotel. I wonder what he'd think of today's vessels... :think:

 

[CR]

Well, a quick search showed me that my France/Norway info is out-of-date. Curious that I missed the news, but for those interested, here's a good starting point: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_France_(1961) (SS Blue Lady? Sheesh... :roll: )

By the way, a former co-worker of mine & his bride honeymooned aboard the Norway several years ago. I guess they won't be having an anniversary cruise aboard!