Titanic: The Untold Gay Story

Other than unsubstantiated rumors about Leonardo DiCaprio's sexual orientation back in the 1990s, there's been virtually no gay connection to the Titanic. Sure, there's Jack Fritscher's 1986 gayrotic novella Titantic: The Untold Tale of Gay Passengers and Crew, but that was as fictional as the White Star line's original assertion that the doomed ocean liner went down in one piece. Fortunately, author and historian Hugh Brewster (above left) has written "Queer Lot of People," a chapter detailing the lives of gay passengers in his marvelous new book Gilded Lives, Fatal Voyage: The Titanic's First-Class Passengers and Their World.

Brewster's book provides revelations about gay Titanic passengers including artist and writer Francis Millet (above right) and his friend (and former roommate) Major Archibald Butt, military aide to presidents William Howard Taft and Theodore Roosevelt. Homoerotic letters written by Millet to gay poet Charles Warren Stoddard help support the author's conclusion about two of the passengers.

In the video interview below with Canada's Xtra!, Brewster provides fascinating details about several of the men profiled in his "Queer Lot of People" chapter, and the author explains the connection of one passenger to Oscar Wilde.