Eleanor Shuman enjoyed the movie "Titanic" so much that she saw it three times. She cried as she watched, "especially when the ship was breaking up and sinking and all the lives were lost," said her son, Earl Shuman.
But unlike the millions of other Americans who have flocked to theaters in recent weeks to see the Hollywood hit, Mrs. Shuman viewed it from a distinct perspective.
As an 18-month-old child, she was a passenger, along with her mother and brother, on the doomed ocean liner that sank on its maiden voyage across the North Atlantic on April 14, 1912. More than 1,500 passengers died, but Mrs. Shuman and her family were picked up by another ship, Carpathia , and were among the hundreds that survived.
Mrs. Shuman, 87, who died Saturday in Sherman Hospital in Elgin, was one of seven remaining survivors of the Titanic. She lived alone in her Elgin home until about three weeks ago, when she was admitted to Sherman Hospital complaining of back problems. She later was moved to a rehabilitat ion center, where she contracted the pneumonia that caused her death, Earl Shuman said.
In a 1995 Tribune interview, Mrs. Shuman talked about having been aboard the Titanic as it sank. She described her recollections as a combination of her memories and those of her mother.
"I was being held in my mother's arms," she said. "I was crying. People were screaming."
Every spring, Earl Shuman said, someone would contact his mother to talk to her about the disaster. Two years ago, he said, her family was invited on a cruise to the site where the Titanic sank, about 400 miles off the Newfoundland coast.
"It was kind of eerie," he said. "They had a memorial service on the bow of the ship, and Mom got to say a few words and said goodbye to friends who were lost in the Titanic."
Other survivors include two sisters and two grandchildren, Visitation will be from 4 to 8 p.m. Tuesday in the Laid Funeral Home, 310 S. State St., Elgin. Services will be at 1 p.m. Wednesday in the funeral home.