1878
At 1:00 a.m., the 161 foot, 3-mast wooden schooner PESHTIGO and the 143 foot, 3-mast wooden schooner ST ANDREW collided and sank near Cheboygan, Michigan and the Straits of Mackinac. Newspapers of the time claimed that forest fire smoke hampered visibility. Both vessels sank quickly. Two of the crew of PESHTIGO were lost, but the rest were rescued by the schooner S V R WATSON. The entire crew of ST ANDREW was rescued by the Canadian propeller OCEAN.
1885
The tug NIAGARA had the schooner MOUNT BLANC in tow while coming rounding to pick up the schooner REINDEER near Stag Island on the St. Clair River. The MOUNT BLANC struck the wreck of the tug B.B. JONES. The JONES had exploded in Port Huron on 25 May 1871, and the wreck was towed to the head of Stag Island where it was abandoned. After striking the wreck of the JONES, the ore laden MOUNT BLANC sank. She was later recovered and repaired and lasted until 1901.
1892
The whaleback steamer WASHBURN (steel propeller freighter, 320 foot, 2,234 gross tons) was launched by the American Steel Barge Co. (Hull #124) at W. Superior, Wisconsin. She lasted until 1936, when she was scrapped at Cleveland, Ohio.
The American Steel Barge Company, West Superior Wisconsin, Captain Alexander Mc Dougall manager, held the first triple launching on the Great Lakes, which included the whalebacks PILLSBURY, WASHBURN and the small tug ISLAY. A crowd in excess of 10,000 people witnessed the event. Only the tug ISLAY remains.
The PILLSBURY (steel propeller whaleback bulk freighter, 320 foot, 2,234 gross tons) was launched by the American Steel Barge Co., at West Superior, Wisconsin. She was rebuilt at Conneaut, Ohio in the winter of 1918-1919 (315.75 feet x 42.25 feet x 24.16 feet; 2,394 gross tons- 1,465 net tons) when she received straight sides and a flattened deck. In 1927, she was converted to crane vessel, with two cranes on deck. In November 1934, she stranded on the north pier at Muskegon, Michigan in a storm and then broke in half. She was scrapped the following year. In 1927, the B. F. AFFLECK (Hull#178) was launched at Toledo, Ohio by Toledo Shipbuilding Co., for the Pittsburgh Steamship Co.
1903
JOHN CRAIG was seriously damaged in a grounding on Simmons Rock in the Straits of Mackinac. Once refloated, the wooden steamer was taken to St. Ignace and declared a total loss. It was subsequently rebuilt as PANAMA only to be lost in a storm on November 1, 1906.
1938
The WILLIAM A. IRVIN began her maiden voyage for the Pittsburgh Steamship Co., leaving Lorain, Ohio for Duluth to load iron ore.
1950
Five lives were lost and another 12 passengers injured aboard the passenger ship CITY OF CLEVELAND III when it was in a collision with the Norwegian freighter RAVNEFJELL in fog on Lake Huron. The former was a total loss while the latter was repaired and returned to service. It became b) RINGSTEIN in 1955 and visited the Great Lakes through 1958. It was wrecked near Achona Point, Ghana, on September 11, 1966.
1959
The Liberian registered MONROVIA became the first saltwater vessel of the Seaway era to sink on the Great Lakes. It went down in heavy fog on Lake Huron after going off course and colliding with the downbound ROYALTON off Thunder Bay Island. The vessel landed upright on the bottom and some of the cargo of steel was salvaged in the 1970s.
1980
MONTREALAIS of Upper Lakes Shipping and ALGOBAY of Algoma Central collided head-on in heavy fog on the St. Clair River and both suffered massive bow damage.
JEAN LYKES collided with and sank an 18-foot fishing boat in the St. Clair River, 2 miles north of St. Clair, MI. The American flag saltwater vessel was later beached at Alang, India, for scrapping as b) VELMA LYKES on July 9, 1994
1993
INDIANA HARBOR set a record cargo, loading 71,369 tons of western low sulfur coal at Superior’s Midwest Energy Terminal and transporting it 50 miles to Silver Bay, Minnesota.
1994
While departing Bay City, McKEE SONS was swept crossways in the Saginaw River and went aground. Four tugs pulled the ship free without damage save for some shoreline erosion.
Contributors & Sources
Skip Gillham, Jody Aho, Max Hanley, Joe Barr, Dave Swayze, Mike Nicholls, Father Dowling Collection, Ahoy & Farewell II, and the Great Lakes Ships We Remember series from the Marine Historical Society of Detroit.
