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| "A WORD FROM THE CAPTAIN" |
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Good day from the Bridge, this is your Captain speaking... This week I am proud to say that the Crew from White Star Momentos have been awarded the merchandise contract for what will be the play of the year, Martin Lynch's 'THE TITANIC BOYS' , running from 8th to 25th August in the Belfast Grand Opera House. This is the story of the Guarantee Group, the group of eight men hand picked by Thomas Andrews to join him (the nineth) for the maiden voyage of the Titanic, these men were on-board to fix any problem that occured on the voyage. Sadly none of these men were to return home as they all lost their lives on Titanic.
Learn more about this amazing play coming soon to Belfast.
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The Titanic Boys by Martin Lynch
Two weeks before the Titanic was due to sail, Chief Designer Thomas Andrews visited the main trade workshops: the fitters workshop, the plumbers, joiners and the electricians. He asked each foreman to nominate his best apprentice. When the foreman named a young apprentice, Thomas Andrews announced that the apprentice would be sailing on the maiden voyage of the Titanic as part of a Harland & Wolff Guarantee Group.
Consequently, four young men, Alfie Cunningham (age 21, apprentice fitter, Spamount St), Ennis Watson (age 18, apprentice electrician, Madrid St.), William Campbell (age 17, apprentice plumber, Earl St.) and Frankie Parkes (age 18, apprentice plumber, Agincourt St.) were plucked from a work force of 15,000 to embark on a historic journey that would make headlines around the globe and hold the worlds fascination for a further 100 years.
These four young apprentices joined Thomas Andrews and four senior tradesmen; Roderick Chisholm, Head draughtsman, Bill Parr, Head electrician, Artie Frost, Lead Fitter and Rab Knight, senior fitter to make up the Harland & Wolff Guarantee Group. Whilst initially helping the ships engineers and officers to get acquainted with the workings of the ship, the Guarantee Group also acted as troubleshooters. They dealt with any immediate problems or snags on the workings of the ship and took notes for ways of improving it.
Each of these men had a story. Roderick Chisholm loved the Olympic but told his wife there was something about the Titanic he did not like. He didnt want to sail on her. Bill Parrs wife was homesick for Lancashire and had told her husband that after this trip they were to return home. Artie Frost was the most loyal of Thomas Andrews workers and refused to leave the engine room and the attempts to keep the lights of the ship going until the very end. Rab Knight was a street fighting loyalist who had left a severely crippled daughter behind and stepped onboard the Titanic not knowing if the operation she would go under while he was away would allow her to walk or cripple her permanently.
But it is the four young apprentices our story concentrates on.
Not long after being selected, the four young men finally realise the epic nature of the venture they are about to embark on. Upon leaving Southampton, they explore the Titanic, sample its luxuries and come into close contact with its wide range of passengers, filthy rich and dirt poor, leaving their heads spinning. Never having left the north of Ireland in their lives before, they ponder the great city of New York, its myths, its fame, its pitfalls and its opportunities.
Apprentice fitter, Alfie Cunningham is their leader. He plays in an orange flute band and fancies himself with the women. Half way across the Atlantic Alfie suddenly has a thought: should he jump ship and start a new life for himself in New York ? Ennis Watson, the apprentice electrician is the clown of the group as well as being an aspiring poet. He has ambitions of presenting samples of his own poetry to Walt Whitman while he is in New York. William Campbell is the baby of the group. His mother has recently been diagnosed with TB and he is tortured by her fate while he is on the ship. Frankie Parkes the apprentice plumber is the 'communist' of the group, the young agitator and radical. He is a member of William Walkers Independent Labour Party and a constant critic of the capitalists, Bruce Ismay and William Pirrie.
The Titanic Boys is the powerful true story of nine ordinary Belfast men who found themselves at the centre of an extraordinary story. They knew the Titanic better than anybody else in the world. They built the Titanic. They sailed on it. And they died on it. This their story.
To Book Tickets follow the link below to the Belfast Grand Opera House.
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| http://www.goh.co.uk/the-titanic-boys |
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| "PRODUCT OFFER OF THE WEEK" |
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COMING SOON TO OUR PREMIER RANGE
A TITANIC 3D CRYSTAL IN A BEAUTIFUL PRESENTATION BOX.
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