PIGEON FORGE — As the 98th anniversary of the April 15, 1912 sinking of the Titanic nears, residents and visitors to the Smoky Mountains will soon have the unique opportunity to walk the halls and decks of the famous ship and experience a small portion of what the more than 2,000 passengers and crew felt on that fateful night.

The Titanic World’s Largest Museum Attraction is set to open in April, providing 30,000 square feet of the artifacts and photographs you would expect to see in a museum, plus many interactive opportunities, activities specifically for children and glimpses into the way of life for those sailing on the luxury liner.

John Joslyn and his wife Mary Kellogg are owners of the attraction, their third such venture. The first Titanic museum was opened in Orlando, Fla., and their second in Branson, Mo. The Orlando location has since closed, but the Branson location continues to bring in thousands of people each year. In Pigeon Forge, Joslyn said they expect 750,000 people a year will embark on the tour of museum.

Kellogg said the journey for museum “passengers” begins in the pavilion, where they are provided with a boarding card.

“And on that boarding card it will tell you who you are and why you are leaving on this ship and where you are going, and what class you are,” she said. The name you will be given is one of the 2,208 souls on board at the time of her sinking. Almost 1,500 of those souls were lost.

For the couple, especially John Joslyn who helped organize a 1987 expedition and served as executive producer on “Return to the Titanic…LIVE,” documenting the adventure, honoring the memory of those lost in the tragedy is their main goal with the museum.

“The ship is a celebration of her crew and her passengers that were aboard,” Kellogg said, in referring to the museum.

After participating in the $6 million expedition and traveling the more than 2 miles down to the ocean floor to see the doomed ship, Joslyn decided he wanted to do something to pay tribute to the ship, her crew and passengers.

Touring exhibits were held first before he decided to build permanent exhibits, his latest being in Pigeon Forge.

The experience, while similar to the touring exhibit, has much more to offer. There are more than 20 galleries in the museum.

“The heart of the ship, though, the one that everybody wants to see, is what we call our million dollar grand staircase,” Kellogg said. “And it’s actual size. So for the first time in the world, you’ll actually walk that grand staircase and go up to a the first-class suite.”

There were two millionaire suites aboard this ship, and we pay tribute to the Strausses,” Kellogg said. “They were the founders and owners of Macy’s department store. It’s also the same suite that was used in Jim Cameron’s picture, to tell the story of Jack and Rose.”

“So there will be two people we’ll be talking to,” she added. “The historians that want to know about these suites and the pop culture that want to see where Jack and Rose were.”

Passengers will also see a full-size replica of a third-class cabin, the first of its kind in the world of cruise lines, Kellogg said. Before that, she said third-class passengers would travel in what was referred to as steerage, named for the fact the dormitory style accommodations were also sometimes used for cattle.

“You’ll eventually end up at the bridge and the bridge represents actually what the steering motion was and you’ll be able to look out and see the starry night, which was a moonless night on April 15th,” Kellogg said.” When you leave that gallery, you’re now going to experience how cold it was that night. You’ll walk on the promenade deck. It is 32 degrees. For the first time in the world, you’ll actually feel an iceberg and you’ll experience how cold that water was at 28 degrees.”

The iceberg will measure 12 feet tall and continue to grow in the refrigerated room.

From there, you can watch a short film on the making of the Titanic, developed from film once owned by an employee of Harlan and Wolfe, the ship’s builder, on the ship and found after his death in a potting shed. Luckily, Joslyn said, the film was still in good enough condition to reproduce.

Other images you will see include a collection of photographs discovered not too long after the ship itself was found in the mid 1980s.

“One of the most important galleries we have, is when Titanic set sale, she was behind schedule about six months, so they thought we’ll take her pictures when she gets to New York City,” Kellogg said. “Fortunately for us, there was a student studying to be Jesuit priest, and he was a amateur photographer and he got on and South Hampton England, and he got off at Queenstown, Ireland. If he had not gotten off, we would have no pictures of the Titanic, and for the first time in the world, we have exclusive rights to all of these photos.

“So you’ll be able to see, for the first time in the world, a young boy aboard this ship,” she said. “It was the only photo of a child taken on this ship, and his name was Robert Spedden. He was traveling with his parents. They’ve been all over Europe for the last three months, and they’re on board the ship and I will tell you that they did survive. As they got into the lifeboat, he had always carried with him a small bear, as he got into the lifeboat he accidentally dropped the bear into the lifeboat. All lifeboats were brought back to New York City. A crew member recognized that the bear belonged to the young lad and did reunite them. And that Christmas, his mother gave the greatest Christmas gift she could ever give. She wrote the story of this great tragedy through the eyes of a bear and it became a world classic children’s book called “Titanic the Polar Bear.”

It’s stories like that the Joslyn and Kellogg wish to preserve with their museum. The crew of the Titanic museum is well schooled on the history of the ship and all of it’s more than 2,000 passengers and crew. Kellogg said they attend a two-week class on all things Titanic to give their passengers the full experience. They’re educated on everything from etiquette to little known facts about the Titanic, including the fact the floor of the opulent grand staircase was covered with a new product of the early 20th century — linoleum.

From the perspective of someone’s who’s been to the bottom of the ocean and seen the Titanic for himself, Joslyn hopes the passengers who visit the museum can experience the awe and wonder he did when looking out of a porthole and seeing the ship for the first time.

“It’s like nothing you’ve ever encountered before,” he said. “It’s unique in itself. It’s like having an e-ticket on a Disney ride.

“You’re in awe,” he said of seeing it the first time. “You’re in such a dark void down there, even though you have lights. And all of a sudden you turn a corner and there it is in front of you, looming, and it’s massive. It’s an experience of a lifetime.”

Visitors will get an idea of what he saw in the Discovery Room, that shows what the Titanic looked like when she was found more than 20 years ago.

“You’ll be looking like at the sea floor here, with the two pieces of the Titanic, the bow and the stern and what the debris field looks like,” Joslyn said. “And overhead will be remotely operated vehicles, simulating what is actually used to dive to those depths.”

“You’ll be able to take your submersible and take it through the ship,” Kellogg said.

Before you leave the Titanic, you will find out the fate of the person’s whose name you received at the beginning of the tour. One of the final galleries includes the Memorial Wall.

“At this point you’ll find out the fate of your passenger,” Kellogg said. “Also in this gallery is the one and only life vest tied to a passenger. It was tied to Madeline Astor, married to the richest man on board.

“Again I treat it as a celebration of the ship and her passengers,” she said. “But it’s also, how do you pay respect to those who gave their lives? It’s simply by telling their story.”