By Dorie Turner
Associated Press
ATLANTA ó The brightly lit room looks like any nondescript warehouse packed with boxes and dusty shelves, but inside this plain brick building is nearly $200 million worth of treasures from the world’s most famous shipwreck.
The 5,500-piece collection contains almost everything recovered from the wreckage of the RMS Titanic, which has sat 2.5 miles below the surface of the Atlantic ocean since the boat sank on April 15, 1912.
When the fine china, brine-soaked shoes and water-stained sheet music aren’t on tour around the world, they have a permanent home in Atlanta, the headquarters of Premier Exhibitions, which has guardianship over the artifacts.
“It’s like the Smithsonian ó you could be here for weeks and not see everything,” said Leslie Cone, an assistant registrar with Premier, as she looked at the collection of delicate papers from the Titanic. “There’s just endless surprises and wonders in this collection.”
About 200 pieces from the Titanic collection are being exhibited at the Georgia Aquarium, the first time the show has been at an aquarium.
Officials with Premier are hoping the tactic will breathe new life into the 14-year-old show and help visitors better grasp the role the ocean has played in the story of the ill-fated ship.
And aquarium officials hope the first-of-its-kind exhibition will bring more visitors to one of the world’s largest fish tanks, where attendance numbers have been on a steady decline since it opened in 2005.
“Any time an attraction opens, attendance inevitably is going to slide from your opening year,” said aquarium spokesman Dave Santucci. “We’re trying to make sure people don’t feel they’ve seen everything at the aquarium.”
The Titanic collection has helped unlock the mystery behind what was once the world’s largest passenger ship, which eventually became the watery grave of 1,517 people. The collection includes everything from fine china and cookware to a 30,000-pound hunk of the ship’s hull.
In the Atlanta warehouse where the artifacts are stored, there is a constant hum of humidifiers that protect metal and paper from moisture in the air.
On a recent day, Cone and another colleague carefully packed up items to ship to the aquarium show. Wearing white cotton gloves, they slowly picked up a pair of dainty women’s slippers and placed them in a crate full of foam and tissue paper. The bow-topped shoes laid in a leather suitcase on the bottom of the Atlantic ocean for close to a century, but they still have the imprint of a foot on the sole.
The tanning process for leather in the early 1900s included a chemical that wards off ocean microbes that would have normally destroyed most nonmetal pieces. That chemical is the only reason so many artifacts from the Titanic have been recovered in such good condition.
In the “paper room” of the warehouse, sheet music, currency and journals bear water stains and some tears but few other signs they were in the ocean for decades. In the room where metals are stored, an asparagus pot and a wok have some dents, holes and a vivid green patina but look more like they were pulled out of an attic rather than a ship wreck.
The china still boasts the intricate rope and porthole pattern and the iconic White Star Line logo ó a flag with a single large star in the middle. A green bottle still has champagne left in it.
“When I look at this, I think of who would be eating off of these pieces and it really helps me to connect to the Titanic on a personal level,” said Cheryl Mure, director of education for Premier, as she held a teacup.
One of the most remarkable recoveries was a leather case of perfume vials, which contain oil that gives off a sweet odor.
The process to get a piece ready for exhibition is long and often tedious, said registrar Becky Parker.
When artifacts are recovered from the wreckage site, they are immediately placed in tanks of salt water. The treasures are slowly transitioned to salt-free water and then dried the next few months. Paper is freeze dried and then vacuumed to remove all salt and debris.
Some pieces take a few months and other take up to two years to get ready for exhibition, Parker said. But Premier is careful to not change the condition of the artifacts other than to stabilize them so they won’t deteriorate any more, she said.
“We believe it tells the story in a more accurate and compelling way by conserving them,” she said.
The Titanic wreck site was first discovered in 1985 by oceanographer Robert Ballard. Two years later, Premier subsidiary RMS Titanic Inc. began the first of seven recovery missions to the wreckage to collect artifacts. More trips are planned though no dates have been set yet.
The exhibition, which runs at the aquarium through spring 2009, first began touring in 1994 and has traveled as far away as Sweden, France, Switzerland and Argentina. Company officials say all proceeds from the show ó which has drawn more than 20 million visitors worldwide ó go back to recovery efforts. Its next stop has not yet been announced.
The Titanic, which was called “unsinkable,” hit an iceberg about 1,000 miles east of Boston and sank on its maiden voyage from England to the United States. Nearly 100 years later, it remains one of the most deadly maritime disasters of all time.
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On the Net:
RMS Titanic Inc.:
www.rmstitanic.net/
Premier Exhibitions:
www.prxi.com/