Did you know the first-ever movie about the Titanic starred an actual Titanic survivor?
And unlike the ship, it’s unlikely the film will ever be seen again.
Hi. I’m Erin McCarthy, and this is The List Show.
Long before James Cameron’s blockbuster hit theaters in 1997, there was Saved From
the Titanic. This 1912 silent film premiered just one month after the ship sank, despite
critics who reasonably deemed it way too soon. It starred 22-year-old Dorothy Gibson, a model
and actress who had boarded the ill-fated ocean liner following a European vacation.
After Titanic struck an iceberg on April 14, Gibson became one of roughly 700 people out
of about 2200 on board to escape via lifeboat. Her survival story became fodder for Hollywood
almost immediately upon her return home.
The film supposedly mashed together real images of Titanic Captain Edward Smith and the ship’s
launch with a newly recorded performance from Gibson. The actress even wore the same outfit
she had on the night of the disaster. Saved From the Titanic was a hit with moviegoers
in 1912, but modern audiences will never get to see the first Titanic film. Two years after
its release, the only known print was destroyed in a studio fire. Today you can watch at least
a dozen movies inspired by the Titanic saga, but none that star a real figure from the
historic event.
Saved From the Titanic is one of many lost treasures I’ll be sharing with you today,
from irreplaceable works of art to literal pirate treasure. Near, far, wherever you are,
the List Show goes on... unlike the treasures in this video. Let's get started.
Though many valuable items have been recovered from the actual shipwreck, some of Titanic’s
physical treasures are lost for good. That includes Merry-Joseph Blondel's painting 'La
Circassienne au Bain’. Mauritz Håkan Björnström-Steffansson, the son of a Swedish pulp baron, which was
apparently a thing, brought the oil painting onto the ship with him in 1912. Though Björnström-Steffansson
survived, he was unable to save his prized possession.
He would later file a claim against the White Star Line for $100,000—or roughly $2 million
today. If the masterpiece was indeed worth that much, it would make it the highest-priced
treasure lost in the disaster. On a brighter note: while the painting itself may be lost,
an artist working under the pseudonym John Parker *was* able to conduct research and
create a reproduction of it in the early 2010s.
When The Story of the Kelly Gang premiered in 1906, it was the longest film audiences
had seen. Though accounts vary, it likely ran around 60 minutes, which would make it
the world’s first feature-length film. Produced in Australia, it followed the country’s
infamous outlaw Ned Kelly, and it won over critics and moviegoers alike. But like many
movies from the silent era, it’s now considered lost: No full copies of The Story of the Kelly
Gang are known to exist today, but a few clips have survived.
In 1979, a few minutes of footage were found beneath a bed in an abandoned house, and some
time later another film snippet was recovered from a landfill. The biggest discovery came
in the mid-2000s, when several more minutes were unearthed from the archives of the British
Film Institute. The incomplete movie was edited together and released on DVD in 2007. Though
it does feature some thrilling scenes, viewers used to Hollywood’s three-act structure
may be a little lost.
One of the many mysteries surrounding the Romanovs is the case of the missing Fabergé
eggs. In the late 19th century, gifting bejeweled eggs made by the House of Fabergé jewelry
firm became an Easter tradition for imperial Russia’s royal family. The czars Alexander
III and Nicholas II commissioned 50 of the precious knick-knacks between them.
During the Bolshevik’s February Revolution in 1917, the Fabergé eggs were removed from
the palace and taken to the Kremlin in Moscow. Many were later sold to raise funds for the
Russian government, and today the whereabouts of seven imperial eggs are still unknown.
It’s possible that the current owners have no idea they’re holding onto a priceless
piece of history. Some years back, a scrap dealer found a sapphire-and-diamond-encrusted
golden egg at an antique sale and bought it for $13,302. He eventually learned it was
one of the original Romanov eggs, and was valued at $33 million. As we proved in our
episode on incredible yard sale finds, you should always be looking through your neighbor's
junk for valuables—at their invitation, of course.
Few filmographies are as widely studied as Alfred Hitchcock’s, but one of his movies
definitely isn’t watched in film schools. His second film, a silent drama called The
Mountain Eagle, wasn’t preserved in the years following its premiere in 1926. But
Hitchcock wasn't exactly heartbroken about it: He reportedly told François Truffaut
that the film wasn't his best, and he was actually relieved it was lost. Still, even
though it likely wasn’t on par with his later classics like Psycho and Vertigo, The
Mountain Eagle’s place in film history makes it a lost treasure to cinephiles.
Polish Princess Izabela Czartoryska was known for collecting priceless artifacts. She founded
Poland's first museum—the Czartoryski Museum—which still operates in Krakow today. But the location
of her most famous treasures are unknown. In 1800, the princess assembled a collection
of precious relics from the Polish royal family. The memorial chest contained 73 items, including
an ivory box that belonged to King John III and fine watches from several Polish monarchs.
The Royal Casket was looted during the Nazi Occupation of Poland in World War II, and
today the whereabouts of its contents are a mystery.
Spanish pirate Amaro Pargo is famous for his lost treasure. When he died in 1747, he left
behind a will bequeathing a hoard of gold, silver, and precious gems to his niece. She
likely wasn't too grateful for the gesture, however. Amaro didn’t specify the location
of his hoard, so his niece was never able to claim her inheritance. Since then, several
places have been ransacked by people hoping to get rich off of Amaro’s treasure. His
former house in Spain and the cave he used as a hideout are both popular spots for treasure
hunters, though if the bounty is there it’s never been uncovered.
A famous episode of Sesame Street only played once before it disappeared from airwaves for
good. In the 1976 episode, actress Margaret Hamilton appeared as the Wicked Witch of the
West nearly four decades after playing the character in The Wizard of Oz. During her
visit to Sesame Street, she loses her broomstick, threatens to turn Big Bird into a feather
duster, and wins the heart of Oscar the Grouch. It sounds like a delightful mash-up of two
of the most famous children’s properties of all time, but sadly, not everyone agreed.
PBS was inundated with complaints from parents, some of whom claimed that seeing the villainous
character had traumatized their kids. The network never aired the episode again.
Today it’s widely considered lost media, but some say it’s still in an archive somewhere.
This belief was bolstered in 2019 when New York’s Museum of the Moving Image screened
a few minutes of the episode at a “Lost and Found” event for Sesame Street’s 50th
anniversary. Footage was leaked onto the internet, but there isn’t much hope the full episode
is ever going to follow.
Doctor Who fans will be sad to hear that 97 episodes from the early seasons are lost.
From the 1950s through the mid-1970s, the BBC wasn’t too concerned with conserving
its media. Most television shows from this time were meant to air once, and storing bulky
videotapes was expensive. The British network dealt with this problem by erasing old tapes
and reusing them whenever they ran out of room in their archives. The BBC wiped out
60 to 70 percent of its programming during this era as a result, including the entire
early days of Doctor Who—253 episodes in total.
It’d be an easy problem to fix if some fans could just get their hands on a working TARDIS,
but in the meantime, the BCC and the show’s devoted fan base have managed to salvage more
than half of those once-missing episodes in some form. Episodes turned up in all sorts
of places, including car boots (which are basically the UK’s version of flea markets),
various BBC departments around the world, and even the basement of a Mormon church.
When the Flor de La Mar sank to the bottom of the Indian Ocean in 1512, it brought down
a legendary treasure haul with it. The Portuguese ship was said to be carrying up to 60 tons
of gold and 200 chests of diamonds, emeralds, rubies, and sapphires when it vanished during
a storm. If found, the bounty on board would be worth billions today. Though many people
have searched the seabed where Flor de La Mar may have ended up—with some even claiming
to have found it—the shipwreck and its valuable contents remain lost.
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