APRIL 10, 1912 FILE PHOTO; AP PROVIDES ACCESS TO THIS PUBLICLY DISTRIBUTED HANDOUT PHOTO PROVIDED BY THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS
In this 1912 photo made available by the Library of Congress, Harold Bride, surviving wireless operator of the Titanic, with feet bandaged, is carried up the ramp of a ship. April 15, 2012 is the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic, just five days after it left Southampton on its maiden voyage to New York. It was a news story that would change the news. From the moment that a brief Associated Press dispatch relayed the wireless distress call _ "Titanic ... reported having struck an iceberg. The steamer said that immediate assistance was required" _ reporters and editors scrambled. In ways that seem familiar today, they adapted a dawning newsgathering technology and organized saturation coverage and managed to cover what one authority calls "the first really, truly international news event where anyone anywhere in the world could pick up a newspaper and read about it." (AP Photo/Library of Congress)