James P. Delgado is a maritime archaeologist with five decades of experience and field projects that include being the first archaeologist not associated with the salvage to dive to Titanic.  His work emphasizes the ships and wrecks of the 19th and 20th centuries. He was the founding director of the U.S. Government’s maritime preservation program in the National Park Service, and his subsequent role as the director of NOAA’s maritime heritage program.  In that role he was the U.S. Government’s policy lead for Titanic.  He also served as the lead scientist for the 2010 scientific mapping of the wreck site of Titanic undertaken by RMS Titanic, Inc., Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, NOAA, the NPS, and the Institute of Nautical Archaeology (INA), and at that time was INA’s President and CEO.  He is the author or editor of more than two dozen books on maritime archaeology and history. Ole Varmer, adviser at The Ocean Foundation, has practiced the UCH law for 35 years. He was the lead attorney on the Agreement, Guidelines, legislation and litigation on Titanic.  He was the attorney in the establishment of the Florida Keys, Stellwagen Bank, and Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuaries. He represented NOAA in shipwreck litigation in the Keys, Channel Islands and the Brother Jonathan Supreme Court  case. He advised on the inscription of Papahānaumokuākea on UNESCO Mixed Natural and Cultural Heritage List and was the heritage expert for the US in negotiations leading to the 2001 Convention on the Protection of UCH. In 2019 he was the legal expert for UNESCO’s Evaluation Report on the 2001 Convention. He has dozens of publications, including the 2014 UCH Law Study,  articles about Titanic and  the chapter on US UCH law for The Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage: National Approaches in an International Context (Brill, 2025).

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• Chapter 1. Introduction: Titanic’s Place in History.- Chapter 2. Why Titanic Mattered to the US Government.- Chapter 3. Impact of the Loss of Titanic on Maritime Safety and International Law and Policy.- Chapter 4. The US Government Response.- Chapter 5. Admiralty Jurisdiction, Maritime Law of Salvage, and Titanic.- Chapter 6. Traction for an International Agreement.- Chapter 7. International Agreement: Negotiation, and Entry into Force.- Chapter 8. Controversy and Conflict.- Chapter 9. The Future of Titanic: Next Steps?.