 When James Cameron (I) (qv) was writing the movie, he intended for  the main characters Rose DeWitt Bukater and Jack Dawson to be  entirely fictitious. It was only after the script was finished that  he discovered that there had been a real "J. Dawson" who died aboard  the Titanic. This "J. Dawson" was trimmer Joseph Dawson, who had  been born September 1888 in Dublin, Ireland. His body was salvaged  and buried at Fairview Lawn cemetery in Nova Scotia with many other  Titanic victims. Today, his grave stone (#227) is the most widely  visited in the cemetery.