History Smashers: The Titanic

By Kate Messner and Matt Aytch Taylor

Myths! Lies! Secrets! Uncover the hidden truth behind the sinking of the Titanic with beloved educator/author Kate Messner. The fun mix of sidebars, illustrations, photos, and graphic panels make this perfect for fans of I Survived! and Nathan Hale's Hazardous Tales.

On April 15, 1912 an "unsinkable" ship called the Titanic unexpectedly hit an iceberg and sank to the bottom of the North Atlantic. Right?

Wrong! Nobody was really talking about the Titanic being unsinkable until after it sank.

The truth is, four different ships wired the Titanic to report icebergs and field ice in the area. But the Titanic never slowed down. In fact, when the Californian warned that it was trapped in ice, the Titanic's wireless operator was so busy sending outgoing messages that he replied, "Shut up!" No joke.

Discover the nonfiction series that demolishes everything you thought you knew about history.

Don't miss History Smashers: The Mayflower, Women's Right to Vote, and Pearl Harbor.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Random House Children's Books
• Release date: Apr 6, 2021
• ISBN: 9780593120453

Kate Messner

New York Times bestselling author Kate Messner is passionately curious and writes books for kids who wonder, too. Her titles include award-winning picture books like Over and Under the Snow, The Next Scientist, and The Scariest Kitten in the World as well as novels for older readers like Breakout and The Trouble with Heroes. Kate also writes the popular History Smashers graphic nonfiction series and leads the multi-author team behind The Kids in Mrs. Z's Class chapter books. She splits her time between upstate New York and southwest Florida. www.katemessner.com @KateMessner

Book preview

Cover for History Smashers: The Titanic

THE HISTORY SMASHERS SERIES

The Mayflower

Women’s Right to Vote

Pearl Harbor

The Titanic

Book title, History Smashers: The Titanic, author, Kate Messner; illustrated by Matt Aytch Taylor, imprint, Random House Books for Young Readers

Text copyright © 2021 by Kate Messner

Front cover art copyright © 2021 by Dylan Meconis

Back cover art and interior illustrations copyright © 2021 by Matt Aytch Taylor

History Smashers: The Mayflower excerpt text copyright © 2020 by Kate Messner. Illustrations and cover art copyright © 2020 by Dylan Meconis.

History Smashers: Pearl Harbor excerpt text copyright © 2021 by Kate Messner. Illustrations and cover art copyright © 2021 by Dylan Meconis. Photograph copyright © German Federal Archives/Bild 183-S55480.

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

Random House and the colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

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Educators and librarians, for a variety of teaching tools, visit us at RHTeachersLibrarians.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Messner, Kate, author. | Taylor, Matt Aytch, illustrator.

Title: The Titanic / Kate Messner; illustrated by Matt Aytch Taylor.

Description: First edition. | New York: Random House, [2021] | Series: History smashers | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2020037630 | ISBN 978-0-593-12043-9 (trade) | ISBN 978-0-593-12044-6 (lib. bdg.) | ISBN 978-0-593-12045-3 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Titanic (Steamship)—History—Juvenile literature. | Shipwrecks—North Atlantic Ocean—History—Juvenile literature.

Classification: LCC G530.T6 M475 2021 | DDC 910.9163/4—dc23

Ebook ISBN 9780593120453

Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.

Penguin Random House LLC supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to publish books for every reader.

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For the readers of Peru Intermediate School

Contents

Cover

History Smashers

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Introduction

Chapter One: Unsinkable? The Building of the Titanic

Chapter Two: Setting Sail

Chapter Three: Steaming Toward Disaster

Chapter Four: Urgent Calls for Help

Chapter Five: To the Lifeboats!

Chapter Six: A Race Against Time

Chapter Seven: Rescue at Sea

Chapter Eight: Inquiries and Investigations

Chapter Nine: Search for the Titanic

Chapter Ten: More Research, More Answers

A Titanic Timeline

Author’s Note

Bibliography

Image Credits

Excerpt from History Smashers: The Mayflower

Excerpt from History Smashers: Pearl Harbor

You’ve probably heard of the Titanic, the great unsinkable ship that crashed into an iceberg and sank in the icy North Atlantic, killing more than 1,500 people. Maybe you’ve read about brave heroes who gave their lives in the service of others on that frigid night, or cowardly villains who only cared about saving themselves. Perhaps you’ve heard heartbreaking details: how there weren’t enough lifeboats and how third-class passengers were locked away from the boat deck, where they might have been saved.

The tale of the Titanic is legendary—but only parts of that tragic story are true. When we take a closer look—through eyewitness accounts, historical evidence, and the work of modern-day archaeologists—other parts come crashing down. Here’s the real deal about that not-so-unsinkable ship that captured the world’s attention after it hit an iceberg on the night of April 14, 1912.

ONE: Unsinkable? The Building of the Titanic

Mention the Titanic, and most people think of the disaster at sea. But the truth is, the first victims of the Titanic died while the ship was still being built.

The shipyard in Belfast, in what is now Northern Ireland, was a dangerous place. Piecing together a nearly nine-hundred-foot-long ship that weighed more than forty-six thousand tons was no small job. With thousands of men working at once, accidents were common.

Sometimes workers dropped tools or rivets—the heavy steel pins that held the ship together. Staging, or scaffolding, collapsed, and people fell. He’s away to the other yard, the men would say when they had to share the sad news of a worker who had died on the job.

Workers leave the Harland and Wolff shipyard at the end of a shift, 1911.

The first victim of the Titanic was an Irish teenager who fell from a ladder and fractured his skull on April 20, 1910. He’d been part of a riveting crew on the ship. On June 17, 1911, the Belfast News-Letter reported that forty-nine-year-old Robert Murphy fell to his death when some staging collapsed. His son, also a Titanic shipyard worker, had died in an accident just six months earlier. The following March, the same newspaper carried the story of a man who’d suffered severe injuries working on a crane when he was crushed in the machinery. There were 254 official accidents recorded during the building of the Titanic, including at least eight fatalities.

Believe it or not, that wasn’t a bad safety record for a shipyard. The Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast, where the Titanic was built, was one of the most modern in the world at that time and had a reputation for designing and building high-quality ships.

Harland and Wolff built ships for a company called the White Star Line, which transported passengers and cargo across the North Atlantic, between England and New York. In the early 1900s, two new ships built for that route, the Titanic and her sister ship, the Olympic, were designed at the Harland and Wolff drawing offices. The architects drew up plans in big rooms full of long tables and