Titanic mystery solved by Canadians

For 90 years, the identity of a baby who perished on the Titanic was a nagging unknown. Now, thanks to a team of Canadian researchers, the mystery has been solved.

Using DNA, historian Alan Ruffman of Halifax, and Ryan Parr of Thunder Bay, Ont., identified the 13-month-old boy as Eino Viljami Panula from Finland.

Wrapped in a fur-lined jacket, Panula's body was plucked from the icy waters off the coast of Newfoundland where the Titanic sank in 1912 after hitting an iceberg. He was buried in Halifax, but it wasn't clear who he was.

Last May, Panula's remains were exhumed.

Forensic experts found three teeth in the grave, which suggested the boy was about a year old. That ruled out the suggestion by the original coroner that he was a two-year-old from Sweden.

The search was then narrowed down to a five-month-old Swedish baby, a seven-month-old English infant and Panula, all Titanic victims who had never been located.

Parr and Ruffman began a transcontinental search for relatives to obtain DNA samples.

With the help of a genealogist, they located Magda Schleifer, a Finnish woman.

After an American lab processed Schleifer's blood sample and sent it to Parr at his lab, the match was confirmed. Schleifer's great aunt was Panula's mother.

The researchers contacted Schleifer who was shocked by the news and came to Halifax to visit her long-lost relative's gravesite.

"Now we know who he is," she said, kneeling over his headstone. "It was just so good to help."

Schleifer's journey has been captured on film and made into a documentary that will air on PBS Nov. 20.