For New Jersey and the rest of the nation, the big stories of 1920 would be Prohibition and the fact that all American women would for the first time be permitted to cast their ballot for president of the United States. At the Jersey Shore, three stories would dominate all others; one would be the building of a future landmark, another the saving of an existing one, and finally, of course, a shipwreck.

At the time, no one knew that one of the greatest tales of rescue at sea would have its beginning in Portsmouth, N.H.