1869
ADELL (2-mast wooden schooner, 48 foot, 25 gross tons, built in 1860, at Milwaukee, Wisconsin) was driven ashore during a storm about a half mile below Bay View Pier near Milwaukee. Her skipper had every penny he owned sunk into that vessel. He was able to salvage her rigging and spars and left them on the beach overnight. The next day he returned and found that all had been stolen during the night.
1870
BADGER STATE (3-mast wooden bark, 150 foot, 302 tons, built in 1853, at Milwaukee, Wisconsin) stranded and wrecked at Sleeping Bear Dune on Lake Michigan during a storm.
1883
MANISTEE (wooden side-wheeler, 184 foot, 677 tons, built in 1867, at Cleveland, Ohio) broke up in a gale west of the Keweenaw Peninsula off of Eagle Harbor, Michigan. This is one of Lake Superior’s worst disasters. Estimates of the number who died range from 23 to 37.
1887
PACIFIC (wooden propeller freighter, 187 foot, 766 gross tons, built in 1864, at Cleveland, Ohio) was loaded with lumber bound from Deer Park, Michigan, for Michigan City, Indiana. After leaving the dock, she grounded on a shoal due to low water levels. The nearby Lifesaving Service took her crew off and then returned for the captain’s dog. She was broken up by a gale on 19 November.
1892
The ANN ARBOR NO 1 arrived at Frankfort, Michigan on her maiden trip.
1901
The wooden freighter ELFIN-MERE was damaged by fire at Green Bay after a lamp exploded in the engineroom. The crew got away safely although an engineer was burned. The vessel was rebuilt the following year and returned to service in 1903 as b) CHARLES B. PACKARD.
1908
PASCAL P. PRATT was carrying anthracite coal from Buffalo to Milwaukee when it caught fire in the engineroom off Long Point, Lake Erie. The blaze spread quickly and the wooden vessel was beached. All of the crew got away safely. The hull burned to the waterline and the remains sank.
1909
The JAMES S. DUNHAM (steel propeller bulk freighter, 420 foot, 4,795 gross tons, built in 1906, at W. Bay City, Michigan) encountered heavy seas and began hitting bottom where charts indicated 35 feet of water, even though she was in ballast and only drawing 17 feet of water. Rather than risk tearing the bottom out of her, the captain decided to beach her at Marble Point, just east of the Bad River outlet. After the heavy snow showers cleared, a message in a bottle was floated ashore to an observer.
1923
GLENSTRIVEN, loaded with 160,000 bushels of oats, was wrecked at Cove Island, Georgian Bay in wind and fog. The vessel was enroute to Midland and was salvaged December 5 by the Reid Wrecking Co. The damage was too severe to repair and the hull was scrapped at Collingwood in 1924.
1927
JOLLY INEZ stranded at Saddlebag Island in the False Detour Channel and was abandoned.
1964
THOMAS F. COLE and INVEREWE collided in heavy fog off the southern end of Pipe Island in the St. Marys River. Both ships were repaired but the latter was later lost as d) THEOKEETOR off Mexico following another collision on June 20, 1973.
1965
The LAWRENCECLIFFE HALL sank in the St. Lawrence after an early morning collision with the SUNEK off Ile d’Orleans. The former, a laker in the Halco fleet, rolled on its side but all on board were saved. The ship was refloated in March 1966, repaired and returned to service. It later sailed as DAVID K. GARDINER and CANADIAN VENTURE before scrapping at Alang, India, in 2005. SUNEK received bow damage but this was repaired and this ship was scrapped at Barcelona, Spain, as b) NOTOS in 1979.
1967
CALIFORNIA SUN, a Liberty ship, made one trip through the Seaway in 1966. It suffered an engineroom explosion off Nicobar Island on the Indian Ocean and was gutted. The abandoned ship was taken in tow by JALARAJAN, a familiar Seaway salty, and delivered to the Seychelles.
1973
The tug portion of the PRESQUE ISLE (Hull#322) built by Halter Marine Services, New Orleans, Louisiana, was up bound in the Welland Canal en route to Erie, Pennsylvania, to join with the barge.
1978
FRED R. WHITE JR (Hull#722) was launched at Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin.
MONT ST. MARTIN was battered by a storm on Lake Erie and escorted to Southeast Shoal area by the STEELTON.
NYX visited the Great Lakes in 1958 and returned through the Seaway in 1959. It sustained severe fire damage at Sidon, Lebanon, as c) DOMINION TRADER. It was subsequently blown aground by strong winds November 30-December 1 and broke in two.
1979
ALDORA dragged anchor while off Port Weller and was blown aground, only to be freed the same day. This ship was scrapped at Vado, Italy, in 1985-1986.
SARONIC SEA was also anchored off Port Weller when it dragged anchor and stranded at the foot of Geneva Street in St. Catharines. The hull was not refloated until December 6. The ship had first visited the Great Lakes as RAVNANGER in 1964 and was later a victim of the war between Iran and Iraq, being shelled with mortar fire at Basrah on September 25, 1980.
1981
Interlake’s JOHN SHERWIN entered lay-up in Superior, Wisconsin and has not seen service since.
1986
CARINA, an SD-14, first came through the Seaway in 1969. It was abandoned by the crew as d) HYMETUS when the hull cracked in heavy weather 180 miles SSE of Hong Kong while enroute to Shanghai, with steel. The ship sank the next day in the South China Sea.
1989
The steel bulk freighters SIR JAMES DUNN and GEORGIAN BAY in tow of the Panamanian tug MC THUNDER arrived at Aliaga, Turkey for scrapping, 129 days after departing Thunder Bay.
1990
Michigan-Wisconsin Transportation Co. ceased operations, ending more than a century of carferry service. The last run was made by the BADGER, with Capt. Bruce Masse in command.
2009
CSL ASSINIBOINE went aground near Cardinal. It had to be lightered and was released on November 21.
Contributors & Sources
Skip Gillham, Joe Barr, Dave Swayze, Father Dowling Collection, Max Hanley, Steve Haverty, Ahoy & Farewell II, and the Great Lakes Ships We Remember series from the Marine HIstorical Society of Detroit.
