Read the following passage and identify the topic sentence. (Hint: It's not always the first sentence.) It is not always a bad thing to "miss the boat," Marny influential people missed the Titanic, which began and ended its doorned voyage in 1912. For example, J. Pierpont Morgan, the famous banker and founder of General Electric and U.S. Steel, had arranged a personal suite and his own private promenade deck on the ship. It sailed without him, though, because Morgan decided to continue his vacation in France instead of returning to the United States, As a result, the "Napoleon of Wall Street" avoided a watery death. Another famous person who missed the boat was Alfred vanderbilt, who was an heir to the vanderbilt shipping and railroad empire. Vanderbilt cancelled his voyage on the Titanic at the last minute to lengthen his European vacation. Unlike J. P. Morgan though, Vanderbilt seems to have been fated to be lost at sea; three years after missing one sinking ship, he died on another-the Lusitania. Coincidentally, the famous inventor Guglielmo Marconi also missed the Titanic, and he was aboard the Lusitania when it went down, but he survived. Source: Daugherty, Greg. "Seven Famous People Who Missed the Titanic," Smithsonian, 1 Mar. 2012, www.smithsonianmag-com/history/seven-famous-people-who-missed-the-titanic-101902418/.
The topic sentence is:
O For example, J. Pierpont Morgan, the famous banker and founder of General Electric and U.S. Steel, had arranged a personal suite and his own private promenade deck on the ship.
O Another famous person who missed the boat was Alfred Vanderbilt, who was an heir to the vanderbit shipping and railroad empire.
O Many influential people missed the Fitanic, which began and ended its doomed voyage in 1912.
O It is not always a bad thing to "miss the boat."