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The Titanic connection


Why is the Titanic part of the Anderson story? How did the name of the famous but ill-fated White Star liner of 1912 come to be listed alongside those of the other, more workaday ships which figure in the family history? It was the sheer drama of the Titanic story which captured the imagination of Roy Anderson when he read about it as a schoolboy well over 30 years after the event and he determined subsequently to unearth the full story of the White Star Line itself. The result, after seven years' research which fostered links all over the world, was White Star,published in 1964, in which he wrote of the line: "I was born after it had died, yet its greatness magnetised me." Widely recognised as a valuable mine of information, it chronicles the rise and fall of the line, whose famous houseflag is pictured here, from the pioneering days of the Australian gold rush to the time when its ocean giants ranked alongside the Cunard Line's household names. The book has been variously described as "a first class history," "the classic history of the White Star Line" and "a great tribute to a great company" and has even been named Titanic Book of the Year 1964. For his work on the book, the author was made an Honor Member of Titanic Enthusiasts of America, later renamed the Titanic Historical Society, the research organisation with a worldwide membership which is dedicated to preserving the history of the Titanic and the White Star Line. The Titanic illustration featured here is from the Anderson collection and is from a card posted on April 26 1912, only 11 days after the great ship was lost, but already bearing the printed wording: "Sunk in mid-ocean, through collision with an iceberg, April 15th, 1912." The autograph is that of Joseph Boxhall, the fourth officer of the Titanic, taken from correspondence with the author.


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