Posted on 11/10/2006 12:25:15 PM PST by MplsSteve
Am winding my way through these posts.
According to the NTSB Report on the sinking of the ship, there was no evidence that the hull had been impacted. I know the Fitz was too close to Caribou Island, and 6 Fathom Shoal, but they found no disturbance along the hull, other than the break, when they investigated it.
There's a great children's book out there titled, The Story of the Bell. It chronicles the last 48 hours of the Edmund Fitgerald. I purchased a copy a few years ago, and read it to my students every year at this time.
Worth getting.
Regards,
Jay
I was making my way through Duluth a few years back and saw the Arthur Anderson in port. I exclaimed to my buddies how neat it was to see that boat. They wanted to know the significance. I told them the story about how it trailed the Fitz.
I was stationed up at K.I. Sawyer AFB at the time the Fitgerald went down. Saw the storm that night, and was amazed at the raw power of that Lake.
We sent helicopters out from our base for several days looking for the ship, or survivors.
I bought a used car, '77 Chevy Camaro in 1979 from the son, Peter Hoyt of the CEO of the company which owned the Edmund Fitzgerald. I had that Chevy Camaro for about 20 years thereafter, believe it or not.
My favorite story:
I was stationed up in the U.P. of Michigan, and saw the storm that sunk the Fitz. A year later the song, The Wreck of the Edmund Fitgerald becomes a hit.
My buddies and I went to Escanaba to a Disco to blow off steam. (Hey... we were young and stupid.) We knew the DJ and offered to pay him five dollars if he'd play our choice of a song. He said, "Sure". We told him to play The Wreck of the Edmund Fitgerald. He said, "They will kill me! " We said, "Yep!"
With a sly grin, he played the song. The ruckus we raised was legendary. Apparently its not a good song to dance to. ; )
You'll get a kick out of some of my posts.
Forgot to ping you to them... sorry!
We have 5 inches of snow on the ground, and 25 degrees at the moment.
I've been playing guitar since my service days, and learned the Song, The Wreck, very quickly. Only a few chords, so a dream to play for beginners.
Thanks, Pete!
Since it was so ungodly hot here last summer, it was the first summer in his life that DH could actually tolerate swimming in Lake Superior in August. It was 108 degrees up there the weekend he and the boys went camping/fishing.
Going down with a ship must just be a horrible way to die. I hate open water. *SHIVER*
Great thread. Thanks to all contributors. I've been all over the Keewenaw Peninsula (mom was born and raised in outside of Calumet). It was our summer vacation every year growing up. My parents returned to the UP twice (having raised the family in SE lower Michigan), once to Lac LaBelle (empties into Superior) and once to Mohawk.
Lightfoot's song is a haunting melody with great lyrics. He has some outstanding music.
Thanks for the ping, Diana.
I was 16, low on cash, had to get back to the US before the start of my final year of High School. I spent about 30 minutes in Thunder Bay, two days total in Canada.
"Since it was so ungodly hot here last summer, it was the first summer in his life that DH could actually tolerate swimming in Lake Superior in August"
One summer we went to lake Namakagan for a week. We took a day trip up to look at Bayfield and the Apostle Islands. It was a good day for it. The temperature was 90 degrees, not very common. After visiting Bayfield and the Islands, we headed west on a a small county road. We came over a hill and out of a waste of scrub pine down to a place where the road touched the shore, and found ourselves on a public beach on a closed bay, almost a lagoon. (There are not many sand beaches on Superior, mostly rock!) The sign indicated it was the beach for a town called Cornupica (I never saw the town, or any houses.)
We parked. There was a vacation camper in the lot. We were walking down to the beach and about 4 Brits in swimsuits dripping wet head to foot came walking back up to the parking lot and their travel home. "Hows the water?" we asked. "Great! Beautiful and clear" They shouted back.
We reached the shore. It was beautiful. You could see the sand ripples on the bottom. Neither of us had a suit, but my wife wanted to wade. She kicked off her shoes and went in. She immediately sucked in her breath and ran back up to the shore yelling! I took off a shoe and stuck a foot it. It was freaking ice water! I guess that the Brits were just too used to bathing in the north Atlantic or something to take any notice or think it unusual. That was my last dip in Lac du Superior.
-- Shameless annual Fitzgerald trivia post --
Did you know about the Milwaukee connection?
So it seemed a natural fit when, as president of Northwestern Mutual in the 1950s, Fitzgerald pushed for the insurance giant to invest in what would become, at the time, the largest bulk carrier ever to ply the inland oceans.We were in Thunder Bay when they caught Bambi, but that's another thread....
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