Claim: A shipyard worker was accidentally trapped and entombed within the Titanic's hull.
Status: False.
Example: [Eaton, 1987]
Work on [the Titanic] proceeded rapidly, so rapidly that a rumour began to spread among yard |
Origins: For thousands of years, man has engaged in gigantic construction projects that dwarfed the mere anonymous human beings who toiled at creating them. The results of those labors — our pyramids and castles, our skyscrapers and ocean liners, our dams and monuments — remain important parts of our cultural heritage for centuries, even thought the objects themselves may long since have ceased to exist. The idea that these objects have become more important than the men they were created by (and for) has led to the same rumor's being attached to so many of them, that safety took a back seat to speed, and men were literally swallowed up and entombed by them during their
creation.
The same whispered stories circulated about the Titanic that would be told of
This legend is often reported as true in connection with the Great Eastern (originally known as the Leviathan), a behemoth of a liner which was a whopping six times larger than any ship previously built when she was launched in 1857. When the Great Eastern was eventually dismantled for scrap some thirty years later, the skeleton of a shipyard worker was reportedly found inside her double hull.
Last updated: 18 December 2005
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