Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary and Underwater Preserve is a United States National Marine Sanctuary on Lake Huron's Thunder Bay, within the northeastern region of the U.S. state of Michigan. It protects an estimated 116 historically significant shipwrecks ranging from nineteenth-century wooden side-wheelers to twentieth-century steel-hulled steamers. There are a great many wrecks in the sanctuary, and their preservation and protection is a concern for national policymakers. The landward boundary of the sanctuary extends from the western boundary of Presque Isle County to the southern boundary of Alcona County. The sanctuary extends east from the lakeshore to the international border. Alpena is the largest city in the area.
SS Appomattox was a wooden-hulled, American Great Lakes freighter that ran aground on Lake Michigan, off Atwater Beach off the coast of Shorewood, Wisconsin in Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, United States in 1905. On January 20, 2005 the remnants of the Appomattox were listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The SS Marquette was a wooden-hulled, American Great Lakes freighter built in 1881, that sank on Lake Superior, five miles east of Michigan Island, Ashland County, Wisconsin, Apostle Islands, United States on October 15, 1903. On the day of February 13, 2008 the remains of the Marquette were listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
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 three 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 there were no deaths 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 Myron was a wooden steamship built in 1888. She spent her 31-year career as lumber hooker, towing schooner barges on the Great Lakes. She sank in 1919, in a Lake Superior November gale. All of her 17 crew members were killed but her captain survived. He was found drifting on wreckage near Ile Parisienne. Her tow, the Miztec, survived. Myron defied the adage that Lake Superior "seldom gives up her dead" when all 17 crewmembers were found frozen to death wearing their life jackets. Local residents chopped eight of Myron's sailors from the ice on the shore of Whitefish Bay and buried them at the Mission Hill Cemetery in Bay Mills Township, Michigan.
The Miztec was built as a 3-masted schooner in 1890. She was later converted to a schooner barge and served as a consort for lumber hookers on the Great Lakes. She escaped destruction in a severe 1919 storm that sank her longtime companion, the SS Myron, only to sink on the traditional day of bad luck, Friday the 13th, 1921, with the loss of all hands. She came to rest on Lake Superior's bottom off Whitefish Point near the Myron.
The F.T. Barney was a 19th-century American schooner that sank in 1868. Her wreck in Lake Huron near Rogers City, Michigan, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1991.
The SS Pewabic was a package freighter that served ports on the Upper Great Lakes. She was launched in October 1863, fitted out in the spring of 1864, and was in active service until she sank off Thunder Bay Island in Lake Huron on August 9, 1865, due to collision with her sister vessel. There was significant loss of life, with a number variously estimated at 100 or 125 passengers and crew of the stricken vessel going down with the ship. If the higher number is accepted, the loss of life made this disaster, in terms of loss of life from the sinking of a single vessel, the seventh-worst tragedy in the history of the Great Lakes, and the worst ever on Lake Huron. The sunken hull of the package freighter is a feature of the present-day Thunder Bay National Marine Sanctuary.
The Norman was a bulk freighter; its wreck in Lake Huron was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2016.
The Kyle Spangler was a wooden schooner; its 1860 wreck site in Lake Huron was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2016.
SS D.R. Hanna was a 552-foot (168 m) long American Great Lakes freighter that operated on the Great Lakes from November 12, 1906 to her sinking on May 16, 1919 after a collision with Quincy A. Shaw. D.R. Hanna was like many other freighters, and was used to haul bulk cargoes such as iron ore, coal and grain.
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.
Iosco was a Great Lakes freighter that served on the Great Lakes from her construction in 1891 to her foundering on September 2, 1905, when she and her tow, the schooner barge Olive Jeanette sank on Lake Superior. While Olive Jeanette's wreck was located in over 300 feet (91 m) of water about eight miles (13 km) off the Huron Islands in the 1990s, Iosco's wreck has not yet been found.
The SS Atlanta was a wooden hulled Great Lakes steamer that sank in Lake Michigan off the coast of Cedar Grove, Wisconsin, United States, after a failed attempt of her being towed to shore ultimately killing 5 out of her 7 crew members on board. Her wreckage still remains at the bottom of the lake, and on November 6, 2017, the wreck of the Atlanta was listed on 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 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.
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 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.
United States
United States 