Titanic: The Exhibition, currently running in Dallas, marked the anniversary of the ship's last stop in port Thursday. Titanic left Southampton's White Star Dock on April 10, 1912 bound for New York. The ship hit an iceberg in the North Atlantic on April 15.
"We're still fascinated with the story of Titanic," says Titanic: The Exhibition Creative Producer Mark Lach. "You can't go to any corner of the world, mention the name, Titanic and not get a response. People have connected to this story for 113 years today, when the Titanic first sailed."
Thursday, the exhibition said it would extend its run in Dallas through Labor Day.
"Dallas has welcomed us with open arms, and we hope to pay that back a little bit by staying through this summer," Lach says.
To mark the anniversary of the ship's last departure from a port, members of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra played, "Nearer My God to Thee," while members of the Coast Guard set a wreath on White Rock Lake.
People who visit Titanic: The Exhibition receive the boarding pass of a passenger at the start of the exhibit. Lach says that boarding pass has the name of a person who did travel on the Titanic and can help visitors make a personal connection to the artifacts they are seeing.
"It has the class they traveled in, a little bit about them, where they were from, why they were headed to the United States, were they coming back or making the journey on their own? They're maybe a third class passenger, making the journey to the United States for the first time," he says.
Visitors see cabins from different classes, 16 galleries and 350 artifacts. Toward the end, they see warnings about ice bergs from other ships and read Titanic's final transmissions.
Before leaving, visitors can leave handprints in a recreated iceberg and look at a passenger list to see whether the person on their boarding pass lived or died. Regardless of class, Lach says visitors will experience the anticipation passengers would have felt when they first left port.
"That was the last thing on their mind was there was going to be an issue," he says. "We experience that in our every day lives. We get up in the morning thinking it's going to be a day like any other and things happen."
Titanic: The Exhibition is located at 14902 Preston Road #386 in Dallas. Ticket prices and availability are available at https://thetitanicexhibition.com/ .
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