Philadelphia Connection: A Possible Inspiration for Titanic Character Names

The names of the Titanic movie's main characters may suggest a surprising connection to Philadelphia.

Most of us have probably seen the 1997 movie, Titanic, but have you ever thought to ask where the main characters' names came from? If you're like me, then maybe not.

Until the other day, that is.

The movie, Titanic, checks a lot of boxes that give it staying power. It was a compelling fictional drama that was set in the middle of one of history's most famous shipwrecks, and it was the first movie that used the Linux operating system for CGI.

As we all probably know, the movie's main characters were Jack Dawson and Rose DeWitt Bukater. Jack was a working class, drifter sort of a character and Rose came from a family of upper crust elitists. The two characters met aboard ship, and the story about a shipwreck turned into a story about the relationship.

If the movie's overarching story is the sinking of the Titanic, the story within the story is a passionate and forbidden romance between Jack and Rose - a shipboard tale of Romeo and Juliet.

Unfortunately, if you go and ask Google where Jack and Rose got their names, you are not going to learn much. Here's what perplexity AI says.

The names Jack Dawson and Rose DeWitt Bukater in the film Titanic were created by director James Cameron specifically for the movie; they are not based on real individuals who sailed on the RMS Titanic.

• Jack Dawson: While some viewers believe the name was inspired by a real Titanic passenger, this was coincidental. There indeed was a "J. Dawson" (Joseph Dawson), a crew member who perished in the sinking, but Cameron didn't discover this until after writing the script. Jack's character is not directly based on Joseph Dawson or any other specific passenger.
• Rose DeWitt Bukater: The character of Rose did not correspond to any actual Titanic passenger. However, she was partially inspired by Beatrice Wood, an American artist and writer with a free-spirited personality and background that influenced Rose's character, especially the older version of Rose.

Both names were selected for their everyman and timeless qualities, fitting the fictitious love story Cameron wanted to weave into the authentic historic tragedy.

So, as far as the world knows, it seems that the names Jack and Rose were just selected with no direct source of inspiration because they seem like "everyman" and "timeless" names.

Maybe.

On Thursday, however, I noticed another possibility. I was trying to find a free online newspaper archive of the Philadelphia Inquirer for the years between 1922 and 1981, when @cmp2020 happened to come in the room. He saw that I was looking at older archives from the Inquirer and he asked me to bring up the story of the sinking of the Titanic.

During its maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City, NY in the United States, the Titanic sank during early morning hours on April 15, 1912. After the sinking, it took a full day for the news to appear in the local Philadelphia newspaper. So we had to find the paper from April 16, 1912.

At the bottom-right corner of the paper's cover story, there was a surprising coincidence. Do you see it?

Right next to the cover story about the Titanic's sinking, there's an advertisement for JACK ROSE RYE.

Is it possible that James Cameron borrowed the character names from that advertisement when he was doing background research for the film?

I don't know, but if not, it's quite a coincidence.

What do you think? Were the names, Jack and Rose, inspired by a Rye Whiskey ad in the Philadelphia Inquirer, or is it just a coincidence?