Titanic
TITANIC begins (Prologue) as Thomas Andrews, the architect of the great ship, pores over the blueprints of his design (In Every Age). The curtain then rises to reveal the Ocean Dock in Southampton, England, where people are gathering to wonder at and to board the ship on sailing day: first a stoker (How Did They Build Titanic?), then additional crewmen (There She Is), officers and stevedores (Loading Inventory), the owner, the architect and the captain (The Largest Moving Object), the Third and Second Class passengers (I Must Get On That Ship), and finally the First Class passengers (The lst Class Roster). Now fully boarded, the ship pulls out as the company sings a prayerful farewell (Godspeed Titanic). One by one, the dreams and aspirations of key characters are presented: Barrett, the stoker who wanted to get away from the coal mines (Barrett’s Song); Murdoch, the ship’s officer contemplating the responsibility of command (To Be a Captain); Kate McGowan and the Third Class passengers who yearn for a better life in American (Lady’s Maid): Chief Steward Etches and the millionaires he serves who exult in the wonders of their world (What a Remarkable Age This Is!) Barrett finds his way to the Telegraph Room where he dictates a proposal of marriage to his sweetheart back home (The Proposal) in a telegram transmitted by Harold Bride, a young telegraph operator smitten with the possibilities of the new radio technology (The Night was Alive).