Today in Great Lakes History – August 7

1789
President George Washington signed the ninth act of the first United States Congress, placing management of the lighthouses under the Department of the Treasury. August 7 is now “National Lighthouse Day” in the U.S.

1844
DANIEL WHITNEY, a wooden schooner, was found floating upside down with her crew of 4 missing and presumed dead. She was 6 miles off the mouth of the Kalamazoo River in Lake Michigan.

1879
While lying at the dock at the C. & L.H. Railroad Yard in Port Huron, the scow MORNING LARK sank after the scow MAGRUDER ran into her at 4:00 a.m. MORNING LARK was raised and repaired at the Wolverine dry dock and was back in service on September 20.

1890
The schooner CHARGER (wooden schooner, 136 feet, 277 gross tons, built in 1868 at Sodus, New York) was struck by the CITY OF CLEVELAND (wooden propeller freighter, 255 feet, 1,528 gross tons, built in 1882 at Cleveland, Ohio) near Bar Point near the mouth of the Detroit River on Lake Erie. The schooner sank, but her crew was saved.

1912
A collision in heavy fog with the RENSSELAER sank the JAMES GAYLEY 43 miles east of Manitou Light, Lake Superior. The upbound coal-laden vessel was hit on the starboard side, about 65 feet from the bow, and went down in about 16 minutes. The two ships were held together long enough for the crew to cross over to RENSSELAER.

1921
RUSSELL SAGE caught fire and burned on Lake Ontario while downbound with a load of wire. The ship sank off South Bay Point, about 30 miles west of Kingston. The crew took to the lifeboat and were saved. About 600 tons of wire were later salvaged. The hull has been found and is upright in 43 feet of water, and numerous coils of wire remain on the bottom.

1948
Edward L. Ryerson, chairman of Inland Steel Company, announced that the new ore boat under construction for Inland would be named the WILFRED SYKES in honor of the president of the company. Mr. Sykes had been associated with Inland since 1923 when he was employed to take charge of engineering and construction work. From 1927 to 1930, he served as assistant general superintendent, and from 1930 to 1941, as assistant to the president in charge of operations. He became Inland’s president in May 1941. He had been a director of the company since 1935. The new ship would be the largest and fastest on the Great Lakes, having a carrying capacity in intermediate depth of 20,000 gross tons. The ship would be 678 feet long, 70 feet wide and 37 feet deep, and would run at 16 miles per hour when loaded.

1957
The first keel plate was laid for Hull #301 at the Great Lakes Engineering Works of River Rouge, Michigan. Hull #301 was built for the Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Co. of Milwaukee and would later be named the EDMUND FITZGERALD. The next year, Northwestern Mutual would contract her to Oglebay Norton for 25 years. Oglebay Norton made her the flagship of their Columbia Transportation fleet.

1958
HURLBUT W. SMITH hit bottom off Picnic Island, near Little Current, Manitoulin Island, while outbound. The ship was inspected at Silver Bay and condemned. It was sold to Knudsen SB & DD of Superior and scrapped in 1958–1959.

The T3 tanker GULFOIL caught fire following a collision with the S.E. GRAHAM off Newport, Rhode Island, while carrying about 5 million gallons of gasoline. Both ships were a total loss, and 17 lives were lost with another 36 sailors injured. The GULFOIL was rebuilt with a new midbody and came to the Great Lakes as c) PIONEER CHALLENGER in 1961, later being renamed MIDDLETOWN in 1962 and e) AMERICAN VICTORY in 2006.

1964
CARL LEVERS, a pre-Seaway visitor as a) HARPEFJELL and b) PRINS MAURITS, had come to the Great Lakes in 1957–1958. It had been an early Great Lakes trader for both the Fjell Line from Norway and the Dutch flag Oranje Lijn. The ship was cast adrift in a cyclone at Bombay, India, on this date, going aground on a pylon carrying electric wires off Mahul Creek and catching fire. The vessel was released and scrapped at Bombay later in the year.

1970
ORIENT TRANSPORTER first came through the Seaway in 1966. It arrived at Beaumont, Texas, on this day following an engine breakdown. The 1949 vintage ship was not considered worth repairing and was broken up at Darica, Turkey, in 1971.

1972
The small Canadian tanker barge TRANSBAY, loaded with liquid asphalt and under tow of the JAMES WHALEN for Sept-Iles, sank in a storm on the Gulf of St. Lawrence. There were no casualties.

1976
The JAMES R. BARKER was christened, becoming Interlake’s first 1,000-footer and the flagship of the fleet for Moore McCormack Leasing, Inc. (Interlake Steamship Co., Cleveland, Ohio, manager). She was built at a cost of more than $43 million under Title XI of the Merchant Marine Act of 1970. She was the third 1,000-footer to sail on the lakes and the first built entirely on the lakes.

1989
CLARENVILLE, a former East Coast wooden passenger and freight carrier, came to the Great Lakes in 1981 for conversion to a floating restaurant at Owen Sound. The restaurant declared bankruptcy in May 1989, and a fire of suspicious origin broke out on this date. It was a long and difficult blaze to control, and the ship sank. It broke apart during salvage in September 1989. The bow was clammed out in December 1989, with the stern removed in April 1990 and taken to the city dump.

1991
FINNPOLARIS first came through the Seaway in 1985. It struck an iceberg in the North Atlantic off Greenland on this date and sank in deep water the next day. All 17 on board were saved.

1994
GUNDULIC came inland under Yugoslavian registry for the first time in 1971. The ship caught fire as c) PAVLINA ONE while loading at Mongla, Bangladesh, on this date and was abandoned by the crew on August 8. The blaze was extinguished on August 9, but the gutted-and-listing freighter was beached and settled in shallow water. The hull was auctioned to a local demolition contractor in 1996 but was ­­­still listed as a hazard to navigation in 1999.

Data from: Skip Gillham, Dave Wobser, Wisconsin Marine Historical Society, Joe Barr, David Swayze, Father Dowling Collection, Ahoy & Farewell II and the Great Lakes Ships We Remember series from the Marine Historical Society of Detroit. Compiled by Roger LeLievre.