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Article: The sinking that shook America. (S.S. Central America ruins discovered off South Carolina coast)
- Article from:
- U.S. News & World Report
- Article date:
- September 25, 1989
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1989 All rights reserved. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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Until last week, when treasure hunters began hauling gold off the Atlantic floor, the sinking of the S.S. Central America about
200 miles east of Charleston, S.C., was one of the sea's saddest but most forgotten events. Yet when the vessel went to the bottom 132 years ago this month, the tragedy shook America as much as the calamities that befell the Titanic in 1912
and the space shuttle Challenger in 1986.
The nation spent the autumn of 1857 gripped by what Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper termed "the most unparalieled disaster that ever occurred on the sea." It was indeed a rare story: A luxury steamship, loaded with people who got rich in the ...