Last U.S. Titanic survivor dies

[WI_DEM]

Lillian Gertrud Asplund, the last American survivor of the sinking of the Titanic in 1912, has died. She was 99. Asplund, who was just five yeasr old, lost her father and three brothers, including a fraternal twin...Asplund's mother, Selma, and another brother, Felix, who was 3, also survived the sinking...The Asplund family had boarded the ship in Southampton, England, as third class passengers on their way back to Worcester from their ancestral homeland, Sweden, where they had spent several years...Asplund's mother would recollect, "I could see the icebergs for a great distance around...it was cold and the little ones were cuddling close to one another and trying to keep from under the feet of the many excited people...My little girl, Lillie, acompanied me, and my husband said, 'Go ahead, we will get into one of the other boats.' He smiled as he said it..."

http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/05/07/titanic.survivor.ap/index.html

[Wickerman]

1. wow

Lillian Asplund never married and worked at secretarial jobs in the Worcester area most of her life. She retired early to care for her mother, who was described as having never gotten over the tragedy.

Selma Asplund (mother) died on the 52nd anniversary of the sinking in 1964 at age 91.

[CoffeeCat]

2. There is another Titanic survivor who is alive...

Millvina Dean.

She was too young to remember the sinking, but she was on board.

Such an amazing story of courage, sacrifice and heartbreak.