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A tug’s line goes taut, a mandolin stops mid-note, and a sleek steamer rolls onto its side in six minutes. That’s the scene an eight-year-old John Griggs never forgot—and the memory he later captured in a gripping article, “Excursion to Death,” lost for decades and now brought back to light. We trace the morning’s small warnings at the dock, the sudden tilt that turned joy into panic, and the eerie contrast of the Eastland disaster unfolding within sight of Chicago’s bridges and streetcars.

From that riverbank, the story widens. Griggs grew into a tireless radio actor—over 5,000 shows—and the calm, persuasive voice of Roger Elliot on House of Mystery. Under trailblazing producer Olga Druce, the program won praise for blending suspense with science, helping kids face fear with clear thinking rather than superstition. That mission resonates with the Eastland’s hard lessons: design matters, ballast and beam matter, and ignoring repeated warnings carries a human cost. We walk through the ship’s troubled history, the investigations that followed, and the strange afterlife of the Eastland as USS Wilmette, a training vessel that sailed safely for years once stripped and balanced.

Along the way, we reclaim Griggs not only as a witness and performer, but as a quiet guardian of culture. He assembled one of the largest private film collections in the country, later forming the foundation of Yale’s Film Studies Center. Memory survives because people choose to keep it: through writing, radio, archives, and stories we pass on. Join us as we connect a six-minute catastrophe to a lifetime of teaching courage, reason, and care in storytelling.

Resources

• John Griggs, “Excursion to Death,” American Heritage 16, no. 2 (February 1965).
• “Olga Druce,” Wikipedia: The Free Encyclopedia
• From Eastland Witness to Radio Legend: John Griggs’ Journey (Flower in the River Podcast)

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• The opening/closing song is Twilight by 8opus
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A century after his birth, George W. Hilton is still guiding our footsteps. This episode honors the transportation historian whose book Eastland: Legacy of the Titanic became the cornerstone of Eastland disaster research. After discovering my own family connection to the Eastland Disaster, Hilton’s work became my north star.

What begins with grief — and a surprise manuscript from a relative — unfolds into a story about how scholarship, storytelling, and stubborn love for truth can rescue memory from the margins.

I share the early frustration of facing Hilton’s dense footnotes while craving a human arc, and how another Eastland researcher’s long-lost web essays built a bridge into the story.

Along the way, we unpack Hilton’s core thesis: how post-Titanic safety regulations, lifeboat mandates, and a top-heavy design converged with ballast flaws to create catastrophic instability. We revisit the numbers debate — death certificates, Coast Guard counts, Tribune tallies — and highlight the rare intellectual humility Hilton showed by documenting uncertainty rather than forcing false precision. It’s a masterclass in research methods, regulatory history, and ethical remembrance.

We also sketch Hilton’s life: Chicago-born, Dartmouth- and University of Chicago-trained, UCLA professor, prolific author on railroads, cable cars, and night boats. Hilton literally went the extra mile, visiting the graves of Eastland victims to verify names and pay respect. He never tried to control the narrative, but instead invited others to complete the record and join the research.

That spirit propels our push to make his work more accessible through digital and audio editions — because discoverability is the lifeline of public history and genealogy.

Resources:

• The Eastland Disaster. Documentary. Southport Video Productions, 1999. Accessed via the Internet Archive Wayback Machine. Featuring George Hilton.
• George W. Hilton. Eastland: Legacy of the Titanic. Stanford University Press, April 1995

• Book website: https://www.flowerintheriver.com/
• LinkTree: @zettnatalie | Linktree
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/natalie-z-87092b15/
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• YouTube: Flower in the River - A Family Tale Finally Told - YouTube
• Medium: Natalie Zett – Medium
• The opening/closing song is Twilight by 8opus
• Other music. Artlist

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This week we take a deeper dive into the Claims and Libels files (In the Matter of the Petition of St. Joseph-Chicago Steamship Company, Owner of the Steamer Eastland, For Limitation of Liability) preserved in the National Archives Catalog. The research revealed a startling omission — a victim missing from the original compilation of Eastland victims and from most later derivative lists (with one exception!)

By cross-checking court filings, obituaries, and family connections, I was able to restore a missing piece of the Eastland story.

This episode is also a tribute to George Hilton, whose Eastland: Legacy of the Titanic remains the cornerstone of Eastland research. His scholarship was unmatched, and like all historians (and genealogists), he knew the work was not complete and invited future scholars to review, correct, and expand on it. By leaving the door open for discoveries like this one, Hilton reminded us that history is never finished — it is a shared effort across generations.

Resources:

• Claims and Libels files, In the Matter of the Petition of St. Joseph-Chicago Steamship Company, Owner of the Steamer Eastland, for Limitation of Liability, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. Records preserved in the National Archives Catalog.
• George Woodman Hilton, Eastland: Legacy of the Titanic (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1995), Internet Archive
• Eastland Disaster Victims: A Virtual Cemetery. Find a Grave.

• Book website: https://www.flowerintheriver.com/
• LinkTree: @zettnatalie | Linktree
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/natalie-z-87092b15/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/zettnatalie/
• YouTube: Flower in the River - A Family Tale Finally Told - YouTube
• Medium: Natalie Zett – Medium
• The opening/closing song is Twilight by 8opus
• Other music. Artlist