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      NOTE: This is a translation of a portion of the Nouveau voyage d’un pais plus grand que l’Europe (Utrecht, 1698) a published description of the very early exploration of the Great Lakes region by French adventurers by the Belgian Recollet missionary father Louis Hennepin. It describes the building and short …

      FORTY-EIGHT YEARS AGO. - The following vessels passed Detroit August 10, 1820 , which we find recorded in the log book kept aboard the schooner Elizabeth ,

    FORTY-EIGHT YEARS AGO. - The following vessels passed Detroit August 10, 1820 , which we find recorded in the log book kept aboard the schooner Elizabeth ,

Maritime History of the Great Lakes

      Launched in 1862, the scow-schooner SARAH CLOW was no backyard sailboat - she was a significant vessel of 192 tons. The SARAH CLOW was driven ashore and destroyed by a storm in the fall of 1869. Thanks to Brendon Baillod for providing some of the information used in these notes. …

      Column 2

      Early Lake History - The Detroit Post has been gathering scraps of lake history, from which we take the following: "On Lake Ontario , previous to 1797 and during that year, the following ...

      A BARK RUN INTO BY A LOCOMOTIVE. - The bark Bentley , in endeavoring to get into the slip at the Burlington and Quincy Railroad bridge, had to haul close up to the bridge with her jibboom projecting over to gain room. While in that position a locomotive whistled for …

      TIDAL WAVE AT GRAND HAVEN - A tidal wave rushed up the Grand River from the lake on the 1st instant, raising the water about thirty inches in a few seconds. A large number of logs were swept from the boom of Messrs. Storr & Co., and Wyman & Burnell, …

      Technically not a tidal wave, this was probably what limnologists call a "seiche." It is usually caused in one part of the lake by high atmospheric pressure or high winds on another part of the lake. However, this is the first time I've ever heard of a seiche occurring on …

      Here is an excellent, detailed description of the iron package freighter PHILADELPHIA at the time of her maiden voyage. For her time she was a very advanced vessel. She served her owners well and profitably until she was lost in a collision of Pte Aux Barques, Lake Huron, in 1893. …

      Column 6 Perhaps most interesting is the fact that the 1852 wreck of the ATLANTIC, near the center of the lake, was visible from the surface! The ARCTURUS was later recovered. She had only been there since the previous fall.

      The propeller B. F. WADE had, in the summer of 1868, successfully raced quite a number of similar vessels on the Detroit River and elsewhere, much to the delight of shoreside gamblers.

      The Congress was lost in October of the same year. It is not known whether she was using the oil-burning apparatus at the time. This concept was indeed revolutionary in an era when many steamers had not yet changed from wood fuel to coal.

      Anyone who has read the Tom Clancy book "The Hunt For Red October" will recognize the basic idea of this propulsion system. The original Toledo Blade article has an error in it, which is corrected in a followup article.

      Whether this was ever resolved or not, the VICTORIA was still listed as both a Canadian vessel and an American vessel when she was wrecked at Oswego, three years later.

      LAKE TRAFFIC IN THE OLDEN TIME. -The Cleveland Herald of the 29th published an interesting letter from Usher Parsons , one of the four surviving heroes of

    LAKE TRAFFIC IN THE OLDEN TIME. -The Cleveland Herald of the 29th published an interesting letter from Usher Parsons , one of the four surviving heroes of Maritime History of the Great Lakes

      Unfortunately, the microfilm of this interesting article on a famous laker was printed in the gutter of the paper and was sewn into a bound volume, which was later microfilmed. As a result, the end of each line is missing. Some words are extrapolated, but anything that is not easily …

      THE CHICORA . - This redoubtable blockade runner, whose arrival we noticed a few days since, is in Mason & Bidwell' s dry dock. Her sections have been put together. They were taken apart by ...

      The travails of the ANNIE VOUGHT and R. G. WINSLOW were among the incidents cited in the appeal to the government to build a light station on Spectacle Reef. The reef lies a few feet below the surface just about dead center in the eastern approach to the Straits of …

      NEW STYLE OF PROPELLER. - The Toledo Blade , commenting upon a new improvement which, it is claimed, will revolutionize the system of propulsion by steam, was in error in part of its description. The inventor's plan is four iron ...

      "Tower's Light" on Lake Huron probably referes to TAWAS light. Most - but not all - of these projects were completed during 1868. More information can be obtained on many of the lights mentioned at: http://www.cr.nps.gov/maritime/ltsum.htm