[Ads-l] Titanic deck chairs precursor?

Stephen Goranson goranson at DUKE.EDU
Fri Apr 22 13:37:27 UTC 2022


Previously cited by Barry Popik:

   White House Memories Recalled By Mrs. Johnson's Press Aide
By NAN ROBERTSON Special to The New York Times. Jan 17, 1969. p. 18 :
Of the incoming White House staff, the always political Mrs. [Elizabeth]

Carpenter said: "All the new people want an office close to the President's.

You should see them scramble. It's like fighting for a deck chair on the Titanic"

The above quote, and later (?) versions with rearrange or shuffling

(NewYaleBkQuotations) etc. present such chair dibbs as comparatively inutile or

futile, though not all so think(?).

Morning Herald, Hagerstown MD Feb. 14, 1944 [n.com]

Francke is determined that his stewardship won't be, as he put it,

"the guy in charge of counting the deck chairs on the Titanic."

LLoyd George in The Times [London] in 1931, in an analogy,

suggested placing Titanic deck chairs near the life boats.

And these wooden chairs may, reportedly, in the ocean, have saved some lives.

SG


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