The History of the Edmund Fitzgerald Ship

When I taught culinary arts to high school students, I was surprised by their lack of knowledge concerning our mitten state. I learned as time moves forward, what I may consider a relevant event in my life has gone unnoticed by newer generations. For example, I used one of my mom’s famous sayings, “you have more excuses than Carter has pills” when they were complaining about a project, until a student asked me who Carter was.

Times change, and current events and trends become a part of our past and I stayed focused on their life and knife skills.

That all changed when I was doing a lesson on the difficulty of cooking on a ship. There are jobs on cruise ships, the coast guard and our own ships in these waters.

I learned none of them had heard of the Edmund Fitzgerald freighter, its untimely demise, or even knew who Gordon Lightfoot was, the troubadour of the “Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald”.  My students were from Port Huron, home to one of the great lakes, for heaven’s sake. I decided this was the hill I was going to die on, and I made it my mission to teach them about the shipping industry.

Shipping in the great lakes contributed to the economic development of all North America. Without shipping, our economy would not be where it is today. (Well, maybe not today, since the Velveeta Voldemort has tanked it.) 

A visit to the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum at Whitefish Point Lighthouse in the upper peninsula, on the graveyard coast of Lake Superior, can teach many of us what our sailors endure carrying commodities throughout the region.

To date, there have been 6,000 shipwrecks and 30,000 mariners have perished in our lakes. The most recent, in 1975, is the ship, Edmund Fitzgerald. It was 411 miles from its destination in November 1975, when a storm overtook the ship and it sank, losing 29 sailors. It was carrying a load of iron ore from Wisconsin destined for Detroit.

The Edmund Fitzgerald Memorial Swim is starting where the ship went down in the upper peninsula. A boat carrying the family of the lost sailors will visit the watery grave, many for the first time, as the swimmers start the relay.  For the next 30 days, swimmers will finish the 411 miles that the Edmund Fitzgerald ship could not, carry iron ore pellets to commemorate the loss.

The swim is not a race. It is a challenge to those of us who want to pay homage to the great ships that support our economy, and the men that work them. 68 of us, organized by epic swimmer, Jim “The Shark” Dreyer. We are invested physically, emotionally and monetarily in finishing this adventure. Each of us is responsible for swimming 30 minutes, before tagging the next swimmer and resting. The relay continues for thirty-minute intervals until our section is done. As we care through Lake Superior, the Sioux locks and into Lake Huron, we will be challenging our strength and internal depth as we follow the untraveled path of the final run of the Edmund Fitzgerald-the one that should have been.

Next time: How I became involved in the relay.

Find out more at www.edmundfitzgeraldswim.org