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John Walter Lord Jr. was an American writer, best known for his documentary book A Night to Remember (1955), an essay about the sinking of the ocean liner RMS Titanic.

Biography[]

Early life[]

Walter Lord was born in Baltimore, Maryland to John Walterhouse Lord and Henrietta (born Hoffman) on October 8, 1917. His father, who was a lawyer, died when Lord was just three years old. His grandfather, Richard Curzon Hoffman, was president of the Baltimore Steam Packet Company ("Old Bay Line") in the 1890s.

In July 1926, at the age of 9, Lord traveled across the Atlantic Ocean, from New York to Cherbourg and Southampton, on the RMS Olympic, Titanic's sister ship. After his secondary studies at Gilman's School in Baltimore, studied history at Princeton University and graduated in 1939. Subsequently, Lord enrolled at Yale Law School, interrupting his studies to join the United States Army after the attack on Pearl Harbor. During World War II, he was assigned to the Office of Strategic Services, working on encryption and decryption of messages in London in 1942. He was the secretary of the agency when the war came to an end in 1945. Later, Lord returned to the Yale University, where he earned his law degree.

Career[]

Lord wrote or edited 11 highly successful books on subjects as diverse as Pearl Harbor (Day of Infamy, 1957), The Battle of Midway (Incredible Victory, 1967), The Battle of the Alamo (A Time to Stand, 1961), Battle of Baltimore (The Dawn's Early Light, 1972), the exploration of the Arctic (Peary to the Pole, 1963), America before the First World War (The Good Years: From 1900 to the First World War, 1960), Coastwatchers (Lonely Vigil, 1977), and the struggle for civil rights (The Past That Would Not Die, 1965) .

Shortly after working as an editor for the J. Walter Thompson advertising agency in New York City, Lord published The Fremantle Diary, edited and annotated from the journals of the British officer and Confederate sympathizer, Arthur Fremantle, which he toured the South for three months in 1863. It became a mild but surprising success in 1954, when Lord was completing A Night to Remember, a work that would earn him much popular impact.

A Night to Remember[]

The book A Night to Remember, which was about the sinking of the Titanic, became a best seller in 1955 and was adapted twice for a television production in 1956 and film into a popular British film of the same name in 1958. The historian tracked down 63 survivors of the Titanic and wrote a dramatic minute-by-minute reconstruction of the history of the sinking of the ocean liner during its maiden voyage. Lord's great knowledge of the Titanic catastrophe made him famous, and he frequently lectured at meetings of the Historical Society of the Titanic. In his final years, Lord wrote another book on the Titanic, titled The Night Lives On: Thoughts, Theories and Revelations about the Titanic, published in 1986. In the following decade, Lord served as a consultant to director James Cameron during the filming of Titanic (1997). Cameron's documentary film Ghosts of the Abyss (2003), was dedicated to the memory of Lord.

Death[]

Lord, who remained single his entire life, passed away on May 19, 2002 at the age of 84, after a long struggle with Parkinson's disease, at his home in Manhattan. Historian David McCullough said of Lord after his death: "He was one of the most generous and caring men I have ever known, and when I wanted to be a writer, he was a great help. I will always be in his debt."

Publications[]

Lord published 12 historical works:

  • The Fremantle Diary (1954) (ed.)
  • A Night to Remember (1955)
  • Day of Infamy (1957)
  • The Good Years (1960)
  • A Time to Stand (1961)
  • Peary and the Pole (1963)
  • The Past That Would Not Die (1965)
  • Incredible Victory (1967)
  • The Dawn's Early Light (1972)
  • Lonely Vigil (1977)
  • The Miracle of Dunkirk (1982)
  • The Night Lives On: Thoughts, Theories and Revelations about the Titanic (1986)

In 2009, Jenny Lawrence edited and published The Way It Was: Walter Lord on His Life and Books. In the 1980s, Lawrence had recorded hours of interviews he had with Lord, in which he discussed his writing and life. After several chapters about his early life in Baltimore and even his time with the OSS in London and Paris, the rest of the chapters are dedicated to the research and writing of each of his books.

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