SS Edmund Fitzgerald, November 10, 1975

[musksnipe]

Originally Posted by danny5

And there was a song written about the incident:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6U219...eature=related

Take off the dark glasses, Tx.

[augie]

Originally Posted by musksnipe

Take off the dark glasses, Tx.

Crap, I missed Danny's link too. The one I clicked on was the submersible taking video. Anyways, we're all on the same page now, right?

[musksnipe]

Originally Posted by augie

Crap, I missed Danny's link too. The one I clicked on was the submersible taking video. Anyways, we're all on the same page now, right?

I left you alone because I know you were just trying to help our poor, lovable, blind, musically challenged, southern redneck moderator.


BTW I have a friend, who lives east of here and works in a mission in Grand Rapids. He is Ottawa Indian. He was born and raised in the U.P. of Michigan.
His grand father died on the Edmund Fitzgerald.
He tells the story every year, in the mission, of how he was pulled from school and told that the ship had gone down. He tells about the ceremony they had to honor him and the other men on board.
The loss of his grandfather changed his life.
He tells the people there how this was the start of his descent into drugs, crime, and prison.
The sinking of this ship had a big impact on the lives of the people who had friends and family on board.
The worse thing about this sinking is that they were only 17 miles from safety.

Yet more links:
Edmund Fitzgerald
Great Lakes Shipwrecks.

From an interview with Gordon Lightfoot (Feb. 2009):

And while I talked to Lightfoot, Ethan started jumping on the couch, recreating the tragic night.
"It's been good to know ya," he shouted out, and then came "The hatch! The hatch! Water's coming in!"
Lightfoot laughed, and then asked if I had told Ethan the ship's story. No, I told him, you did.
"Well, let him know that there are several theories about what caused the sinking," he said. "It could have been driftwood hitting the ventilator cap. When that goes, it leaves a three-foot hole, letting in enough water to upend a ship carrying 26 tons of ore."
But "hatch" better fit the meter of the song, he said, so that's what most people hear in "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald."

[danny5]

For those whom are interested, here is the Detroit Mariners Cathedral site. Rightly so, IMO, there is no mention of the SS Edmond Fitzgerald there, in regard to it's sinking. I live some 25 miles from the church, and I know from sources that the bell did ring 29 times this year. (I did not hear it personally).

Here is what the site says:

"Each Fall, at the "closing" of the waterways, there is the Annual Great Lakes Memorial. Sailors who have died on each of the Great Lakes, during the current year and in perpetuity, are memorialized by the ringing of the great brass "Octarara" bell, along with prayers and petitions from all. (This ceremony has been closely linked with the Edmund Fitzgerald ever since its loss with her crew in 1975, and naturally, it continues to be remembered alongside all other shipwrecks and loss of life at this Fall memorial.) This occasion is indeed a Maritime Memorial Day. Unbeknownst to many, there have been some 20,000 shipwrecks on the Great Lakes since colonial times."

http://www.marinerschurchofdetroit.org/


I do think in retrospect that the worst part of those 29 whom perished was not the sinking, but the hours of terror as they watched this huge ship being torn apart by the fury of those fall winds.

I will probably post every year on this. I met one of the crew, as he made his home there, where I grew up. I didnt know him, but I think that he and my father were friends. I was young, and dont remember a lot about it.

Oddly, I always wondered when I was young, "why are those big boats coming into Portage Canal, and it seems a storm is coming?". It is obvious now, Portage is 1/3 the way between Duluth and Lake Huron. When bad weather came, those ships seek shelter.

[musksnipe]

Originally Posted by danny5

I do think in retrospect that the worst part of those 29 whom perished was not the sinking, but the hours of terror as they watched this huge ship being torn apart by the fury of those fall winds.

Agreed Danny. Plus the fact that every minute they got closer to safety. Sinking within sight of shore (though it was too dark to see) and just a few miles from the safe harbor was the tragedy to me.