Plans For Titanic Replica Provides A Good Lesson

By Stan Bush

DENVER (CBS4) - The wreckage of Titanic may be some 3,500 miles from Denver, but few places care more about its history than Denver -- the home of The Unsinkable Molly Brown.

"They're the primary source materials for the history, we know," said Andrea Malcomb, museum director at The Molly Brown House while looking over the original articles and personal accounts of the night the ship sank.

"They're our way to get into minds and hearts of those on the Titanic," she adds.

Malcomb says recreating the doomed oceanliner, the fever dream of Clive Palmer, an Australian mining tycoon, is a good idea.

"We still can empathize with people who were on board, people filled with hope to move to a new country only to have this disaster happen," said Malcomb.

The company planning to remake Titanic wants to copy the original design, except with modern safety and design -- and enough lifeboats.

The new ship is set to take its maiden voyage in 2022 -- 110 years after the original ship disembarked.

The ship would include the lavish stylings of first class and the brutal conditions in steerage that housed most of Titanic's victims. Malcomb says getting that right justifies rebuilding the ship and would be meaningful considering recent stories of refugee and immigration crisis around the globe.

"We can connect it to immigration issues as we struggle with those today. What did it mean to come to America and chase the American dream?"

Stan Bush is a general assignment reporter at CBS4. His stories can be seen on CBS4 News at 10. Read his bio and follow him on Twitter @StanBushTV.