Lisa Wilkinson

Like, everything about this ship was huge.

Think of a number...

And triple it, because it was at a size and a level that nobody had ever seen before.

And one of the funny details that I found out in researching all of this is that in many ways, J. Bruce Ismay saw the Olympic as a test run for the Titanic.

And Ismay and whoever the ship's designer was would always go on the maiden voyages to see what they could improve, how the passengers were engaging with the ship, what was wrong.

And so they went on the Olympic as a test run because Ismay was determined that the Titanic would be celebrated in a way that no ship,

put to sea would ever be celebrated before.

So there were aspects of the Olympic, he would wander around taking notes and saying, okay, we can do this better.

Those towels need to be fluffier.

You know, this carpet needs to be thicker.

And he decided in order to be able to call the Titanic the

the biggest man-made object ever to be built and the biggest movable object ever to be built, he made the Titanic three inches bigger.

Oh, my God.

Look, I think it's that incredible romance that was attached to this ship.

It was making headlines right around the world.

This was the modern era and everybody knew that if you were on that ship and

You were part of, I mean, what turned out to be an experiment as it was, but you were part of a moment in history that could never be repeated.

And so when they saw the signs going up in Southampton saying that they were looking for crew, both William and Evelyn thought, what an incredible opportunity.

opportunity this would be if we can travel again together.

So they both applied.