The 1913 Storm: When Tragedy Struck the Great Lakes

This is our American stories 1913, the 16th amendment was passed and Woodrow Wilson became president tragedy also struck the Great Lakes is Earl Monty Montgomery, with more on that event.

In 1679, the Great Lakes were changed forever for the first time as the cells Griffin departed from court, becoming the first ship to ever see on the Great Lakes and in 1841.

The links were yet again changed when the Mendelian set sail. The first propeller driven ship to do so in industry took off and by 1913 the Great Lakes had become a major and still developing transportation hub is Rick mixture of like fury with more on that in 1913. Were talking about a mix of different types of transportation analytics.

The sale was still somewhat viable. Most of those old sailing vessels and schooners have been turned into barges were being told by the more efficient steamers didn't have to wait for the winds to be correct, but there were no highways at that time so everything had to be moved, especially these amazing commodities we have in the Great Lakes, coal, iron, or grain. All of this stuff was moved in huge amounts bulk amounts on these raters and not barges. The other work.

There were literally thousands of ships on the Great Lakes hundreds that were regularly being used many that were also laid out they would go by the flow of how much iron ore needed to be moved or later in the season as you got the grain cargoes coming in the coal that had to be stocked up for the winter time so you'd see more ships come out and many of those ships were in perfect condition. They were, whatever could float they can get these cargoes and before the lakes froze up and then all that commerce stop. There weren't a lot of safety regulations having the ultimate safety is, and that the captain himself, he makes the call that will bring his ship and his crew in every one of the captains on the Great Lakes are the most experienced meteorologist. I would replace anyone on television with a ship captain because their lives, literally depend on their ability to be able to read the storm, but there were bonuses and incentives that sometimes help to fight against that common sense that put many of the ships on the bottom and on November 6, 1913, those incentives were working against the better judgment of many captains trying to get one last running before the end of the season for large storm is brewing on the Great Lakes storm that would go down in history as the big blow were simply the 1913 storm, the 1913 storm is one of the few storms where we had a dozen ships lost with all hands. Everybody vanished but we don't see that very often on the hurricanes, much less on the Great Lakes. And we also had storms and especially snow that paralyzed many of the largest cities on the Great Lakes, including legal and so now. Couple that with the fact that today were still missing three of those racks. We don't know where they're at. Eventually leads into an amazing story that I think it still is interesting to tell today the 1913 storm really started off of Lake Michigan as it swept up. It devastated two wrecks that were there. The Louisiana which was actually a vessel. It made into the safety of Washington Bay on Washington Island and it met up with the Hallstead that it already been pushed ashore and the crew would've been fine, except some kind of a lantern or something fell over the cause of fire on board and they had to abandon ship. So the Louisiana burned right to the water line right there is one of the first casualties of the 1913 storm just north of there.

That's where the Plymouth vanished with seven lies being told by a very underpowered hog. The Plymouth was one of the vessels that was empty when it was lost. It was going up to the Straits of Mackinac to pick up a cargo of cedar post and it was pulled by and a very small town called the James Martin there was a bunch of legal disputes that were happening with that, the company that was actually ordering the logs that you will company this was to the point of them actually libeling the ship, meaning they put a lawsuit against the Plymouth and the only way to protect it to make sure that they wouldn't be scuttled for insurance or somehow damaged and protect their interests.

They moved in undersheriff became a US Marshall and Chris Keenan came on board the ship to garden. They were towing from Menominee and they got up around the islands. When the storm hit. That came out of the South.

At first, so they moved around St. Martin's island and had dinner there and basically had everybody aboard the Plymouth weather is more room and once in the storm exposed their height safe harbor where that now it's coming out of the north and starting the build to 60 miles an hour they all jumped out of their respective ships and they asked Keenan if he wanted to come aboard the tog and he thought his chances were better on the Plymouth. He said no I'll stay on board.

This he knew the ship had been rebuilt in a just been re-caulk they really thought because it was larger that that would be the safer vessel, but as they pulled through the straits and they got just below poverty island massive storm hit them at 60 miles an hour tugboat had to order the scooter to drop its anchor 3000 pound anchor the locket into place so they could take off and reach safety. There is just no way they could pull through those waves afterwards they came back to find the Plymouth and they found nothing but later on the bottle washed ashore in Manistee and eventually Chris Keenan's body. The bottle spelled out exactly what it happened during that horrible storm and the message in the bottle was written by Keenan. The unlucky Marshall. He wrote dear wife and children.

We were left here by McCain and the owner of the tog Martin never say goodbye or anything to us basically laid. They laid out that though they lost another man during the night and that the pupil company owed him $35, so it was this note of just tragedy of of this despair of being lost, but also enough to tell his family hated by the way pupil owes money and as it turns out messages in bottles weren't that rare in 1913, or the stuff of urban legends. If you think about it. 1913 there was no radio, there was no way to get a message out and many of them had obviously galleys on board that would have bottles and mustard bottles have been used. Pickled bottles have been used but certainly wine bottles to have have been used to put these messages in a many times I'll put those on board. Sometimes they they would put you know were disappearing forever in a goodbye to their family and we also saw no blame and some of them as well. But during the 1913 storm at least four messages came ashore, and the majority of them were found to be not real. The one that came from the Plymouth Dell was written on a coal receipt that was actually from the coal company that gave call to the Plymouth so it lend a lot of authenticity to it and also when the family side they really believed it was Chris Keenan's handwriting as well, except for a bottom part that had been written by another crewman and he had noted in their felt so bad that another man had written this for me so this is one of those those true notes that came out and really an eyewitness account from 12 ships that vanished without any kind of a survivor. This was the voice that they finally got from what exactly happened during one of these devastating sinkings, but the storm wasn't yet done.

All of a sudden the storm rushes past that Lake goes all the way up in the Lake superior. That's when it sinks the HB Smith. It puts the Torah chief ashore. The Elsie Waldo was also pushed ashore on Keweenaw Peninsula and the refill was lost with all hands up.

I pick island.

The biggest story on on superior at the time was the HB Smith the Henry B. Smith was a large freighter. One of the largest lost in the big storm Capt. Billy Owen was in Marquette. The legend in all the newspaper articles that I've read said that Billy Owen had been criticized for having Lake cargoes all season, and if you read the stories coming out of Marquette. It really kind of plays out that Owen was furious when the iron ore froze because of a rain mist ice storm mechanic came in and froze all of the iron ore into the cars that they Capt. ran out and said you got it you know heat up those cars actually put flame to the train cars to get that cargo into his boat and then when the storm hit.

He ordered the hat that Smith to be literally tied to the dock so that they could withstand the storm and still take the cargo so he could get it down in a timely manner. Now people do talk nowadays that maybe most of those stories were true, but there were a lot of boasting headlines about how he feared no storm and took off without even battening down all of his hatches and as soon as the big snow squall came in the ship vanished and we didn't find it for nearly 100 years, and you're listening to Rick mixed her tell the story of the 1913 storm that took down a dozen ships only come back more of Rick mixed her on our American story. We returned to our American stories and the story of the 1913 storm we last left off. The storm had laid waste to Lake Michigan and Lake superior and it already sunk many ships including the barge Plymouth in the large freighter HB Smith, let's return the story after ravaging Lake superior. The storm would soon turn to Lake Huron for the bulk of the ships sunk in the stroma meet their ends.

One ship that did not think that was the HB Huggett with Ed Tanabe at the helm, and cannot be was a local guy from the thumb who basically got sick of farming and when on board the ships and moved very quickly up to the wheelman.

I I lucked out to me as a journalist you know you start, you know, going through the storm itself and then trying to hit all of the anniversary newspapers and that's where I found an was you during the 50th anniversary and the 60th anniversary. There were stories about this one guy that was part of the storms.

When I called him his his daughter told me that he had had a stroke and that he really probably didn't remember much about it but she thought that evening, I would be worth a try.

So when I went to go talk to me was very, very hard of hearing and I had to unite.

I was shouting questions to him and finally his daughter had to shout tell him about the storm and he told such a riveting story that the hair on my arms stood up straight, so he was at the wheel when the HB Hobgood is going up and down the legs. If you read the stories of the ships that survived. That was the way that they didn't they would stay out in the middle of the lake as best they could, because running aground would be devastating. And they would turnaround which was the most difficult part in the storm and they would head back down the lake and then just keep trying to keep your nose into the wind as best they can, until the storm was over, hoping that it would eventually fade out. Will this storm went 60 miles an hour for 16 hours straight so back-and-forth the HB Hobgood went until finally they got to the bottom of the lake and the captain ordered in the turnaround again.

He could see the lights of pointe Edward, he knew he was close to port Huron going into the St. Clair River but that he was not going to turn around, cannot be had other ideas. Here's at with what he did.

Instead, they said there will order their – but I really care to go share control, the literally pitched up on the beach near where Hotel was thought of all of the ships that were lost during the 1913 storm. It was it was good news for the HB Hobgood to be so close to civilization that wasn't the case for many the other ships like the Charles S. Price. The price had gone up and it got the storm and somehow turn turtle in the air that was still inside the vessel allowed to float so the bow was floating but that the Stern was dragging on the bottom and about 70 feet of water and it wasn't hard to see this giant what looked like a whale of a black bottom boat out there in the newspapers cast for days on exactly what freighter it was and they couldn't get out there because the storm was still kind of brewing. So Isaac calmed down. They finally hired a diver named Baker to go down there and he dove down in realize that it was so murky because of the storm tossed waters that he couldn't see. So he felt the letters and it was Charles S Rice upside down that he felt became back on board and wouldn't wouldn't tell them the name until he got paid.

That's how much he trusted the newspapers.

The ship itself.

We still wonder what happened but as we look at the course of the HB Smith and we look at several other ships that survived the storm by turning around as they turned around if they were iced or heavy on top of their decks which we've seen many big storm victims and especially from 1913.

We've seen frozen pictures of the ice that's accumulated on the decks, making them very, very top-heavy, regardless of the cargo that's below it is a try to make that turn to try to as a run of the lake and they want to come back down again. They make that turn, they expose themselves to winds that will push these long thin ships over and that's what we think might have happened that it might've tried to turn and as it tried to turn it rolled right over.

We also know from the eyewitness accounts that there were 35 foot seas that were there so add in a top-heavy vessel that was never designed to carry that much ice weighed on top and a wind and waves that were banging off of each shoreline and confuse directions and it could be easily imagine that one of those freighters would flip over and that the price actually did.

It sat there and in floated forever and will in floated for over a day and many newspapers got pictures of it and then it slowly sank down to the bottom so they always knew where the Charles price was the price was just one of the many ships that sign during the 1913 storm in total 12 ships within them on the bottom of the Great Lakes and countless others like the Hobgood the beach and battered on the shore. The storm was a truly horrific event. The legacy of the storm is that over 250 sailors lost their lives and the reality is that without radio or without no really good accounts of of who was actually on board the ship is times when sailors would just jump on board and and they would be no real you know real record of of them being on some will never know the exact amount of people lost are the names of everybody who was lost, but to think of it in terms of 250 sailors. That's 200 families that didn't have love ones. I came home from that storm. It was devastating to them and then add in the devastation that was felt by towns like Doddridge where most of that destruction, especially those human bodies came ashore.

It was horrible for them as well and this the pictures of the long marches that would go to the grave marker that Alan Doddridge you can imagine what that whatever must've felt for them as well. The headlines of the stories that that came out of there and the eventual stories that would be generated from those later on. Also add to the magnitude of what that storm was it was one of the worst and in many cases called the being of storms on the Great Lakes, so it probably will never be equal.

We now have better weather forecasting.

We have satellites that fly over the top of the ship. We have communication via satellite via radio.

It's just amazing what that technology is like today in forecasting but we still have people that will try to better the lake see others always that that one that believes that they can get in.

Fortunately, there thousand footers that there are a lot less susceptible to the waves, but you'll be surprised that you even the biggest of all freighters, including the admin Fitzgerald were lost just because the captain made a bad call. Nothing could be built that would withstand the fury of the lakes when they get their very worst and unfortunately that's what happens in November as is like start to cool off and that that warmth from the lakes meets the cold Arctic air, we get horrible snowstorms and we get winds that just tear at ships in every direction and change on a dime and that could happen again tomorrow.

There's still still so many clues out there and every time a ship is found, we start to add another chapter so I don't think the final chapter is been written on the 1913 storm it's over 100 years old but were still discovering new things about it. That's what makes it exciting and you been listening to Rick mixer tell the story of one of America's great water tragedies.

He also told the story of the wreck of the admin Fitzgerald which was riveting, and it's the rest of the story and the song you heard and the real story Gordon Lightfoot song, of course, and one of our other really good order disaster stories. One of our best is also of course the sinking of the USS Indianapolis the worst naval disaster in American history mixture by the way, you can find his work@lakefury.com listen to his podcast. My goodness it was a perfect storm of the frozen ice formations on the deck of the ship's 35 foot seawalls coming at them. And of course the wicked winds 12 ships down all hands lost 250 souls lost the story of the 1913 storm here on our American story