Missing submersible pilot’s wife is descendant of Titanic victims

NEW YORK - Mrs Wendy Rush, the wife of Mr Stockton Rush, the OceanGate chief executive who was piloting the

submersible that disappeared Sunday during a dive to the Titanic wreckage

, is a descendant of two first-class passengers who died when the

ocean liner sank in 1912

, archival records show.

Mrs Wendy Rush is a great-great-granddaughter of retailing magnate Isidor Straus and his wife, Ida, two of the wealthiest people aboard the Titanic for its voyage. Straus, born in 1845, was a co-owner of Macy’s department store.

Mrs Rush, born Wendy Hollings Weil, married Stockton Rush in 1986, according to a New York Times wedding announcement.

Her LinkedIn page says she has participated in three OceanGate expeditions to the Titanic wreckage in the last two years; that she serves as the company’s communications director; and that she is a longtime board member of the company’s charitable foundation.

Mrs Rush could not immediately be reached for comment.

Mrs Rush’s ancestors on the Titanic are perhaps best known for their tragic love story.

Survivors of the disaster recalled seeing Isidor Straus refuse a seat on a lifeboat when women and children were still waiting to flee the sinking liner.

Ida Straus, his wife of four decades, declared that she would not leave her husband, and the two were seen standing arm in arm on the Titanic’s deck as the ship went down.

A fictionalised version of the Strauses’ story was immortalized in pop culture by director James Cameron, whose

1997 film about the disaster

features a poignant shot of an older couple embracing in bed as the waters rise around their cabin.

Mrs Rush is descended from of one of the Strauses’ daughters, Minnie, who married Dr Richard Weil in 1905. Their son, Richard Weil Jr., later served as president of Macy’s New York, and his son, Dr Richard Weil III, is Mrs Rush’s father, according to Joan Adler, the executive director of the Straus Historical Society.

Isidor Straus’ body was found at sea roughly two weeks

after the Titanic sank

, New York Times archives show. Ida Straus’ remains have never been recovered. NYTIMES