OSHKOSH, WI (WTAQ) – A new exhibit coming to the Oshkosh Public Museum is sharing the Wisconsin Connection to the sinking of the Titanic.
The experience shares the stories of twenty people who were on the ‘unsinkable’ giant as it struck an iceberg, 109 years ago. Jeff Taylor is the director of collections for the E/M Group, which owns the artifacts.
“Wisconsin at the state would proportionally high in the number of passengers that had connections, Titanic passengers that is,” Taylor told WTAQ News. “Wisconsin was very, very attractive to immigrants coming from Europe. A good number of those third class passengers either had friendships or family members who had already settled, so they were coming over to basically start new lives.”
Joint research between the group and the museum built a series of fascinating stories about some of the passengers on the trip – and it wasn’t just those wearing tuxedos in the fancy dining hall from the movies.
“We were able to combine archives and fill in some missing gaps and make stories fuller about these people to honor their legacy and tell their stories better,” Taylor said. “Everybody thinks of the first class and how fantastic it was, but really what allow them to even operate and carry out the line were the sheer numbers of third class passengers who were seeking transit to go to the New World. So they’re such a part of this…Wisconsin at that time, there was a lot of farming that was offering opportunities, especially fruit farming. Workers and factory workers, it was it was really a big draw and I think a hopeful place for people coming from the Old World to the new world, per se.”
Out of approximately 5,500 total artifacts that have been pulled from the wreckage over the years, only about twenty have confirmed connections to passengers. One of those twenty is definitively tied to North Central Wisconsin.
“What we did recover was one of the US national bank notes that has the Bank of Merrill, Wiconsin printed on it. It’s pretty fantastic to have the Wisconsin name on something from the Titanic,” Taylor said.
This artifact in the Titanic exhibition has a direct link to Wisconsin. Recovered from inside a leather satchel, this currency was issued by the National Bank of Merrill (Wisconsin). One passenger, Daniel Coxon, was returning home to Merrill aboard the Titanic after a visit to relatives in England. (IMAGE: Courtesy of Oshkosh Public Museum)
And the stories don’t just end with passengers. There are a number of other odd links between the Badger State and the ‘Wonder Ship’.
“The ship was essentially an electric ship, and Wisconsin was on the forefront of developing hydro-electricity,” Taylor explained. “So there’s a bit of a tie-in where the Titanic was advanced, yet Wisconsin also had this great sort of advancement in generating electricity.”
The exhibition will be open from July 21st through October 13th, 2021.
