Night to Remember: Pig on the Titanic: A True Story by Gary Crew

Telling the story of the Titanic to young readers is tricky. On one hand, it is THE classic true tale of danger and heroism, but on the other hand, it is a grim story of death at the hands of human misjudgment and overrated technology.

Gary Crews' Pig on the Titanic: A True Story uses the appeal of a musical toy and the beautifully realistic paintings of illustrator Bruce Whatley to recount the story with a fascinating bit of Titanic lore, the story of Edith Rosenbaum's musical pig and the role it played in the rescue of child survivors of the fatal voyage.

A successful fashion buyer, Edith boarded the Titanic at Le Havre with a good-luck gift from her mother, Maxixe, a music-box pig who played a cheery dance tune when his tail was wound. Passengers aboardship were intrigued when Edith gladly let their children enjoy playing her musical toy.

When the call to take to the lifeboats came in the dark hours of April 14, Edith Rosenbaum hastily wrapped her lucky pig in a shawl and hurried to the icy deck where women and children were being urged into the lifeboats.
When the childless Edith graciously refused to take a place on a departing boat, a well-meaning but confused sailor snatched the bundle holding Maxixe and tossed it into a lifeboat, saying "Madame, if you will not save yourself, I will save your baby!" Finally, Edith, too, jumped into the boat, finding Maxixe damaged but still intact.

As the Titanic sank into the cold waters of the Atlantic, the terrified survivors drifted through the darkness. Sensing the children's fear, Edith began playing Maxixe's little tune. With Edith's gentle example, the children passed Maxixe around, winding his curly tail and cheered by his jaunty music, until a rescue ship found them at dawn.

An author's afterword recounts the facts and grim statistics of the sinking of the Titanic and the happier story of Edith Rosenbaum's long and successful life and the place of honor Maxixe still holds in a museum in New York.

Other books which tell the story of the Titanic for younger readers are Tonight on the Titanic (Magic Tree House series) by Mary Pope Osborne, The Titanic Lost and Found, by Judy Donnelly, Polar the Titanic Bear, by Daisy Speddon, Inside the Titanic: A Giant Cutaway Book, by Ken Marschall, and, for hands-on experience, The Titanic Coloring Book.

For older readers, two historical novels which provide factual detail and plenty of suspense are White Star: A Dog on the Titanic, by Marty Crisp, and Voyage on the Great Titanic, (Dear America series) by Ellen E. White. For readers enthralled with the fate of the the great ship on the ocean bottom, a unique photographic account is that of undersea explorer Robert Ballard, who first located the wreck of the Titanic, Exploring the Titanic and its companion book, THE DISCOVERY OF THE TITANIC: Exploring the Greatest of All Lost Ships. (Hardcover).