Merideth, Lee W. 1912 Facts About Titanic. 1st printing. Mason City, IA: Savas Pub. 1999. wraps. isbn: 1882810333. scarcity: hard to find.

Merideth’s book is a very useful, easy to use reference work on facts about the Titanic. It proceeds in a logical progression chapter by chapter beginning with the birth of the idea for the three giant liners, through the building of the ship, the crew, the voyage, the disaster and the aftermath.The author has the ability to explain the many conflicting aspects of the story in a consistent, understandable style - a real gift.

Considering the sheer number of ‘facts’ in the book (well over the nineteen hundred and twelve promised in the title), there are not too many mistakes. But he does make a few gaffs along the way. The errors really are few and far between though and do not seriously dampen my enthusiasm for this book. It is well researched, and very readable.

Reprint edition, January, 2000 by Historical Indexes Publishing Co., wraps. isbn#0962623741.
Another reprint, February 2001, by Savas Publishing, wraps, isbn#1882810333.

Merideth, Lee W. 1912 Facts About Titanic. signed, limited hardcover edition. Sunnyvale, CA: Historical Indexes Publishing. May, 2001. hardcover. limited to 2,000 copies. isbn: 0962623768. scarcity: hard to find.

The first hardcover edition of this useful work, printed concurrently with the 5th printing of the softcover edition.

Merideth, Lee W. 1912 Facts About Titanic. revised edition. Sunnyvale, CA: Rocklin Press. 2003. hardcover. isbn: 0962623784. scarcity: fairly common.

This revised edition contains an additional 24 pages of new and updated material. Even better, this version includes an index. The front cover painting is completely new as well, and very attractive.

The revised edition is also available in softcover, isbn# 0962623792.

To order this book, send the author an E-mail at [email protected].

Sometimes an idea for a book is so simple, yet effective that it is brilliant. Once you see it, you wonder why it took so long for someone to think it up. This is one of those books.

At its essence, this book is one big index. There are two parts to the index, an alphabetical list of passengers, and a second list for the crew. The important point to emphasize here is that this is the first truly alphabetical list of everyone on board. In most previous lists, for example, many of the first class passengers’ servants were listed with their masters. Meredith breaks out everyone by name and gives each person their own entry. He also lists married women’s maiden names as a separate entry, as well as under her married name. The result is the most easy to use reference to the passengers and crew I have ever seen. The entries alternate between light and lightly shaded bands, making the lists very easy on the eyes.

But it is not just a list of names. Details provided include those who survived, their age at the time of the disaster, their residence, what class they traveled under, their embarkation point and their destination, which lifeboats the ones that survived made it into and amongst the dead, what victim’s bodies were recovered and where they were buried.

There are short additional descriptive notes for most of the entries, with somewhat longer (a short paragraph) commentaries about many of the more well known people.

The crew list follows the same basic format as the passenger list. It includes the crewman’s age, title or function aboard, department they worked in, residence, embarkation point, which lifeboat the survivors made it into, and which bodies of victims were recovered and where they were buried.

There are far fewer descriptive notes about the crew as compared to the passenger list, yet the crewmen who played a major role in the voyage each get a short descriptive paragraph about their part in the story.

Past lists of this kind have been infamous for their inaccuracies. I am no expert on the life stories of the passengers and crew of Titanic, so I cannot speak as to the accuracy of all the entries. I can say, however, that the information about the major players, where I do have some knowledge, seems to be right on.

Finally, from a purely aesthetic point of view, as you can see from the cover photo, this has got to be one of the most spectacular cover art illustrations of all time. It is just gorgeous.

The complete history of the eight vessels named Hornet, of which the most famous was her seventh incarnation, the aircraft carrier that carried Doolittle’s Raiders to Japan. That Hornet was sunk a few months later. The eighth Hornet served during the final 15 months of World War Two, and is the most decorated warship in the American Navy.

This last ship survived the war and eventually became a floating museum in Alameda, California. Merideth’s book doubles as a walking tour of the portions of the ship open to the public.