Lake Huron is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. Hydrologically, it comprises the easterly portion of Lake Michigan–Huron, having the same surface elevation as Lake Michigan, to which it is connected by the 5-mile-wide (8.0 km), 20-fathom-deep Straits of Mackinac. It is shared on the north and east by the Canadian province of Ontario and on the south and west by the U.S. state of Michigan. The name of the lake is derived from early French explorers who named it for the Huron people inhabiting the region.
Presque Isle County is a county in the Lower Peninsula of the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2020 Census, the population was 12,982. The county seat is Rogers City. The county was authorized by state legislative action on April 1, 1840, but the county government was not established until 1871. The government was reorganized in 1875.
Thunder Bay is a bay in the U.S. state of Michigan on Lake Huron. The bay extends from North Point at 45°01′19″N83°15′58″W to South Point at 44°53′00″N83°18′51″W.
The SS Vienna was built in 1873 during the era when steamers were built with sail rigging. She had a 19 year career marked with maritime incidents including sinking when she was just 3 years old. She sank for her final time in fair weather in Whitefish Bay in Lake Superior after she received a mortal blow when she was inexplicably rammed by the steamer Nipigon. Although no lives were lost when the Vienna sank for the last time, more than 100 years later her wreck claimed the lives of 4 scuba divers, the most of all the wrecks in the Whitefish Point Underwater Preserve that now protects her as part of an underwater museum. Her wreck was stripped of artifacts that resulted in the Michigan Department of Natural Resources seizing her artifacts in a raid on the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum in 1992. Her artifacts are now on display in this museum as loan from the State of Michigan.
SS Isaac M. Scott was an American Great Lakes freighter that sank during the Great Lakes Storm of 1913 in Lake Huron, 6 to 7 miles northeast of Thunder Bay Island, while she was traveling from Cleveland, Ohio, United States to Milwaukee, Wisconsin, United States with a cargo of coal.
The Besser Museum for Northeast Michigan is a community museum serving Alpena County and surrounding counties in the U.S. state of Michigan. Alpena is a port city on Lake Huron. The museum defines its role broadly — to preserve, protect and present history and culture closely connected with the heritage of Northern Michigan and the Great Lakes. The museum includes a small publicly-owned planetarium.
The Sport was a tugboat, built in 1873 and wrecked in 1920 in Lake Huron. The wreck site, designated 20UH105, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1992.
SS Choctaw was a steel-hulled American freighter in service between 1892 and 1915, on the Great Lakes of North America. She was a so-called monitor vessel, containing elements of traditional lake freighters and the whaleback ships designed by Alexander McDougall. Choctaw was built in 1892 by the Cleveland Shipbuilding Company in Cleveland, Ohio, and was originally owned by the Lake Superior Iron Company. She was sold to the Cleveland-Cliffs Iron Company in 1894 and spent the rest of her working life with it. On her regular route between Detroit, Escanaba, Marquette, and Cleveland, she carried iron ore downbound, and coal upbound.
SS Ohio was a wooden hulled Great Lakes freighter that served on the Great Lakes of North America from her construction in 1875, to her sinking in September 1894 when she collided with the schooner barge Ironton which also sank in the collision. Ironton was being towed by the steamer Charles J. Kershaw, which was also towing the schooner Moonlight. Ohio was found upright in 2017, over 122 years after her sinking in over 200 feet of water off Presque Isle, Michigan. Ironton is still missing. The researchers who discovered Ohio plan to nominate her for a listing in the National Register of Historic Places.
SS Florida was a wooden hulled Great Lakes freighter that served on the Great Lakes of North America from her construction in 1889, to her sinking in May 1897 when she collided with the larger wooden hulled freighter George W. Roby. Her wreck was located by Ed Ellison in July 1994, in 206 feet (63 m) of water almost completely intact, save for her stern.
SS Etruria was a steel hulled lake freighter that served on the Great Lakes of North America from her construction in 1902 to her sinking in 1905. On June 18, 1905, while sailing upbound on Lake Huron with a cargo of coal, she was rammed and sunk by the freighter Amasa Stone 10 miles (16 km) off Presque Isle Light. For nearly 106 years the location of Etruria's wreck remained unknown, until the spring of 2011 when her wreck was found upside down in 310 feet (94 m) of water.
SS S.R. Kirby was a composite-hulled bulk carrier that served on the Great Lakes of North America from her construction in 1890 to her sinking in 1916. On May 8, 1916, while heading across Lake Superior with a cargo of iron ore and the steel barge George E. Hartnell in tow, she ran into a storm and sank with the loss of all but two of her 22-man crew off Eagle Harbor, Michigan. For over 102 years the location of S.R. Kirby's wreck remained unknown, until June 2018, when her wreck was discovered by the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society (GLSHS) in 825 feet (251 m) of water, completely broken up.
SS Russia was an iron-hulled American Great Lakes package freighter that sank in a Lake Huron gale on April 30, 1909, near DeTour Village, Michigan, with all 22 of her crew and one passenger surviving.
SS Vernon was a wooden-hulled American passenger and package freighter that sank in a Lake Michigan storm on October 29, 1887, near Two Rivers, Wisconsin, with the loss of between 36 and 50 lives, making her one of the deadliest shipwrecks ever to have occurred in Wisconsin. Only one of the people on board survived.
SS John V. Moran was a wooden-hulled American package freighter in service between 1888 and 1899. She was built in 1888 in West Bay City, Michigan, by F.W. Wheeler & Company. She was built for Ward's Crescent Transportation Company of Detroit, Michigan, and was operated as part of his Detroit & Lake Superior Line. She was built to haul both bulk, and package freight. Throughout the 1893 shipping season, John V. Moran ran between Buffalo, New York, and Duluth, Minnesota. She was sold for the first time in 1895 to the Union Transit Line of Buffalo, and once again in 1898 to the Crosby Transportation Company of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
104 was an American whaleback barge in service between 1890 and 1898. The fourth whaleback constructed, she was built between October 1889 and February 1890, in Duluth, Minnesota by Alexander McDougall's American Steel Barge Company, for McDougall's fleet of the same name, based in Buffalo, New York. She was a whaleback, a class of distinctive, experimental ship designed and built by McDougall. The whalebacks were designed to be more stable in high seas. They had rounded decks, and lacked the normal straight sides seen on traditional lake freighters. 104 entered service on April 21, hauling iron ore from Two Harbors, Minnesota.
SS Cayuga was a steel-hulled American package freighter in service between 1889 and 1895. She was built in 1889 in Cleveland, Ohio, by the Globe Iron Works Company for the Lehigh Valley Transit Company of Buffalo, New York. One of five identical sister ships, Cayuga entered service in 1889, carrying package freight between Buffalo and Chicago, Illinois, also making stops in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and Gladstone, Michigan. Prior to her sinking, Cayuga was involved in two accidents. In the first in 1890, when she went aground in a gale just outside of Buffalo harbour; six tugboats managed to pull her free that same day. The second accident occurred in 1891, when Cayuga was involved in a collision with the package freighter Delaware near Cheboygan, Michigan.
PS Keystone State was a wooden-hulled American paddle steamer in service between 1849 and 1861. She was built in 1848 in Buffalo, New York, by Bidwell & Banta for ship-owner Charles M. Reed of Erie, Pennsylvania, and operated as part of his "Chicago Line". A luxuriously furnished palace steamer, she operated between Buffalo and Chicago, Illinois, while also making stops at various other ports. She was built for the passenger and package freight trade, frequently carrying both wealthy passengers and European immigrants who desired to settle in the Midwestern United States. Due to the Panic of 1857, Keystone State and several other paddle steamers were laid up. When the American Civil War began in 1861, she was refurbished, and put back into service.
SS Manasoo was a steel-hulled Canadian passenger and package freighter in service between 1888 and 1928. She was built in 1888 in Port Glasgow, Scotland, by William Hamilton & Company for the Hamilton Steamboat Company of Hamilton, Ontario. During this time, she mainly carried passengers between Hamilton and Toronto, Ontario. Macassa was lengthened in Collingwood, Ontario, in 1905. She was sold twice before being sold to the Owen Sound Transportation Company, Ltd., and was rebuilt and renamed Manasoo; after the sale, she mainly operated between Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario, and Owen Sound, Ontario.
SS Chester A. Congdon was a steel-hulled American lake freighter in service between 1907 and 1918. She was built in 1907 by the Chicago Shipbuilding Company of South Chicago, Illinois, for the Holmes Steamship Company, and was intended to be used in the grain trade on the Great Lakes. She entered service on September 19, 1907, when she made her maiden voyage. In 1911, Salt Lake City was sold to the Acme Transit Company. A year later, she was transferred to the Continental Steamship Company, and was renamed Chester A. Congdon, after lawyer and entrepreneur Chester Adgate Congdon. She was involved in several accidents throughout her career.
