Posted by Andrew on April 11, 1998 at 15:44:18 in host5-171-224-104.btinternet.com:
In Reply to: James Cameron's non-gold portholes. posted by Don Morlan on April 11, 1998 at 14:34:21:
: In one of the popular publicity photos from James Cameron's TITANIC movie (the port side of the ship as they are getting ready to leave Southampton), the ship appeared to have all black (and thus, non-gold) porthole linings.
: YET, in one of Father Brown's famous photos from 1912 (taken with his camera held over the side of the ship looking forward on the starboard side from Southampton's Ocean Dock) the portholes are clearly shiny. Does gloss black really look that shiny, or was it a brass lining? How about photos of the ship on the ocean floor aren't those shiny gold (brass) ? Who is correct and who isn't?
Don,
It would appear that this is the one thing that Jim Cameron got wrong. The portholes did have a Brass 'rim'. As you say this is visible on Farther Browns photograph taken at Southampton. It is also visible, allbeit to a lesser extent on another of Farther Browns photographs, the one in which Captain Smith is looking down from the bridge wing at Queenstown. I too had wondered about this untill I met a fellow modeller who had scratch built an 8 foot long model. He said that he had researched this at the Cunard archives in Liverpool (Cunard later merged with White Star) and the rims were definitely Brass.
I hope this is of some use to you,
Andrew.