The SS William G. Mather is a retired Great Lakes bulk freighter now restored as a museum ship in Cleveland, Ohio, one of five in the Great Lakes region. She transported cargo such as ore, coal, stone, and grain to ports throughout the Great Lakes, and was nicknamed "The Ship That Built Cleveland" because Cleveland's steel mills were a frequent destination.
Lake freighters, or lakers, are bulk carriers operating on the Great Lakes of North America. These vessels are traditionally called boats, although classified as ships. Freighters typically have a long, narrow hull, a raised pilothouse, and the engine located at the rear of the ship.
Col. James M. Schoonmaker, formerly Willis B. Boyer, is a lake freighter that served as a commercial vessel on the Great Lakes for much of the 20th century. Named for Medal of Honor recipient James Martinus Schoonmaker, it is currently a museum ship in Toledo, Ohio.
Medusa Challenger (1977) is a dramatic short film that was Joe Mantegna’s first film. The film has been honored with numerous film festival awards and critical accolades. The film is in the permanent collection of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the American Film Institute Collection in Washington, D.C., and the Chicago Film Archives. The film is one of the few American films widely seen (legally) in the People’s Republic of China.
The SS Kaliyuga was a steamship that sank with the loss of 16 lives on Lake Huron on the night of October 19/20, 1905. The wreck of the Kaliyuga has never been found, and the cause of her sinking remains a mystery.
Harry Coulby was an American businessman known as the "Czar of the Great Lakes" for his expertise in managing the Great Lakes shipping fleet of Pickands Mather & Company and the Pittsburgh Steamship Company. After retiring, he served as the first mayor of the newly incorporated town of Wickliffe, Ohio. His former home, Coulallenby, now serves as the city hall of Wickliffe. He chose the design for Great Lakes ore carriers in 1905 that became the standard for the next 65 years, and was elected to the National Maritime Hall of Fame in 1984.
The Pickands Mather Group is an American company which provides shipping of coal and other bulk commodities, and the purchase, sale, and marketing of bulk coal. Founded in 1883 as Pickands Mather & Company, it once had the second largest shipping fleet on the Great Lakes in the 1910s and 1920s. The company was purchased by the Diamond Shamrock Corporation in 1968, which in turn sold it to the Moore-McCormack Resources in 1973. Moore-McCormack sold Pickands Mather's mining interests to Cleveland-Cliffs in 1986. Moore-McCormack then spun off the Interlake Steamship Company to James Barker and Paul R. Tregurtha in 1987. Pickands Mather was sold to a management group in 1992, and continues to operate as a private company.
SS Clifton, originally Samuel Mather, was a whaleback lake freighter built in 1892 for service on the Great Lakes. She was 308 foot (94 m) long, 30 foot (9.1 m) beam, and 24 foot (7.3 m) depth, and had a 3,500 ton capacity. The self-propelled barge was built by the American Steel Barge Company in West Superior, Wisconsin. Her builders used a design well-suited to carry iron ore, her intended trade. The new vessel was christened Samuel Mather, after a cofounder of Pickands Mather and Company, which at the time was the second largest fleet on the Great Lakes.
The SS Thomas F. Cole was a 605.6 ft (184.6 m) long Great Lakes freighter built in 1907 for the Pittsburgh Steamship Company by the Great Lakes Engineering Works of Ecorse, Michigan. The boat was named after mining mogul Thomas F. Cole. She was launched as hull #27 on January 26, 1907. She was powered by a 2,000 horsepower triple expansion steam engine which was attached to a single fixed pitch propeller. She was powered by two coal-fired scotch marine boilers. She had a top speed of ten knots. She entered service on May 26, 1907. She arrived for her first load of iron ore on May 29, 1907.
The Frank C. Ball was an American Bulk carrier that was built by the Great Lakes Engineering Works of Ecorse, Michigan, for the Globe Steamship Company of Duluth, Minnesota. She was launched on December 9, 1905, as hull #14. She was powered by a 1,700 horsepower triple expansion steam engine and fueled by two coal-fired Scotch marine boilers. Even though Ball was built in 1905, she only entered service in 1906.
The H.P. Bope was an American steel-hulled, propeller-driven Great Lakes freighter built in 1907 by the Superior Shipbuilding Company of Superior, Wisconsin for service on the Great Lakes of North America. She was used to transport bulk cargoes such as coal, iron ore and grain.
The William H. Donner was an American Great Lakes freighter that was built in 1914 by the Great Lakes Engineering Works of Ashtabula, Ohio for service on the Great Lakes of North America. She was used to transport bulk cargoes such as iron ore, coal, grain and occasionally limestone. She operated from 1914 as a bulk carrier to 1970 when she was converted to a floating crane ship with two cranes. In order to facilitate better maintenance most of the ship's superstructure was eventually removed. It remained in service until 2016, when it was deemed obsolete to requirements. In 2020, the vessel, which consisted of only the hull and minus the cranes, was finally sold for scrap. It was towed on December 17 from Marinette Wisconsin to the Purvis Scrap Yard in Soo, Ontario Canada above the Soo Locks. The dismantling process will begin sometime in early 2021.
SS Onoko was an iron-hulled Great Lakes freighter. She was launched in 1882 in Cleveland, Ohio by the Globe shipbuilding firm, as its hull number #4, and sank on September 14, 1915, in Lake Superior near Knife River, Minnesota. According to the Minnesota Historical Society, Onoko is regarded as a prototype of the single-steel hulled Great Lakes bulk carrier, These vessels made possible the cheap transport of bulk cargoes such as iron ore, coal and limestone. Her wreckage still remains on the bottom of Lake Superior and was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1992.
The SS Lakeland was an early steel-hulled Great Lakes freighter that sank on December 3, 1924, into 205 feet (62 m) of water on Lake Michigan near Sturgeon Bay, Door County, Wisconsin, United States, after she sprang a leak. On July 7, 2015, the wreck of the Lakeland was added to the National Register of Historic Places.
Michipicoten is a self-discharging lake freighter owned and operated by Canadian shipping firm Lower Lakes Towing. Michipicoten primarily hauls taconite from Marquette, Michigan, to the Algoma Steel Mill in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. She has a capacity of 22,300 tons, a speed of 12 knots (14 mph), and a length of 689 feet 6 inches (210.2 m).
129 was an American whaleback barge in service between 1893 and 1902. She was built between December 1892 and May 1893, in Superior, Wisconsin,, by Alexander McDougall's American Steel Barge Company, for McDougall's fleet of the same name, based in Buffalo, New York. She was one of a class of distinctive and experimental ships 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. 129 entered service on May 22, hauling wheat from Superior. She was sold to the Bessemer Steamship Company of Cleveland, Ohio, in 1900. In 1901, she became owned by the Pittsburgh Steamship Company of Duluth, Minnesota, when the Bessemer fleet merged into it.
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.
The SS Alpena is a lake freighter. She was built in 1942 by the Great Lakes Engineering Works in Ecorse, Michigan, to carry iron ore. She was originally owned by the Pittsburgh Steamship Company, a subsidiary of United States Steel. After also hauling grain in addition to ore in the 1960s and 1970s, the ship was put into storage in 1982.
United States
