This is an IHeart podcast.

Welcome to Aaron Menke's Cabinet of Curiosity's, A production of IHeart Radio and grim and mild.

Our world is full of the unexplainable.

And if history is an open book, all of these amazing tales are right there on display, just waiting for us to explore.

Welcome to the Cabinet of Curiosity's.

Second chapter. Second chances are hard to come by in life.

We don't usually get the opportunity to redo a terrible job interview or make things right when we've wronged a partner.

Life is oftentimes a one-way trip with no stops

and we're just along for the ride.

But one man achieved the unimaginable.

After being involved in one of the most tragic events in history, he persevered.

He received the second chance of all second chances and refused to let his circumstances sink him.

His name was Richard Norris Williams II,

although he often went simply by Dick Williams. He was born in Geneva, Switzerland,

to American parents from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He could trace his lineage directly back

to Benjamin Franklin. After years of private tutelage at a Swiss boarding school, he decided to take up a new hobby.

Tennis. From the age of 12, Williams trained and honed his skills on the court,

leading to his victory at the Swiss Championship in 1911. The following year, he and his father

traveled to Cherbourg, France, where they boarded a ship bound for America. Norris had been

accepted at Harvard and planned to become a success, both as a tennis star and as a student. Their trip

started out fine, with nothing but blue skies above and a rich future ahead of them. They even dined with a

captain for dinner one night. But then, tragedy struck. Word quickly spread through the decks as

...