Today is the 35th anniversary of the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald, the huge freighter that went down in a storm on Lake Superior in 1975, taking all 29 crew members with it to the bottom. It’s a tragedy that would’ve faded into obscurity except for Gordon Lightfoot’s hit song that came out in 1976, forever searing the name Edmund Fitzgerald in our collective memory. Most of us can’t think of the name of another freighter wreck or freighter, for that matter. It even turns up on an episode of Seinfeld.
The song always strikes a chord with me and brings back memories of going up to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula in the early 70’s where my sister’s husband was stationed at Kincheloe Air Force Base, which closed its gates in 1977. We visited the locks at Sault Saint Marie where the great freighters passed between Lake Superior and Lake Huron, and spent some time looking down on the huge bare decks of the ships as they slowly passed. For all I know, the Edmund Fitzgerald may have been one of them.
I mention this today for no reason other than the memory of those big boats back then and the song that memorialized it and its 29 crewmen as they went down in the big lake they call Gitche Gumee…
Redtree Times 
Another Canadian singer/songwriter wrote songs of men and ships at sea. One song, “White Squall”, is especially relevant to today’s post. Here are the opening lines:
So it’s just my luck to have the watch with nothing left to do
But watch the deadly waters glide as we roll north to The Sault.
I wonder when they’ll turn again, and pitch us to the rail,
And whirl off one more youngster in the gale.
And here’s the late, great Stan Rogers singing “The Mary Ellen Carter”:
Thanks for the Stan Rogers reference. I have to admit I was not familiar with him nor his songs which means, of course, I wasn’t aware of his tragic death at age 33. Interesting.
Tucked into the middle of the song is one particularly terrifying line:
Does anyone know where the love of God goes
When the waves turn the minutes to hours…
It’s a perfect description of an experience everyone with more than an occasional afternoon on the water has endured, albeit to a lesser degree. I love this song, though I’d never play it on board a vessel.
Thanks for the reminder.
I spent many of my years just twenty minutes from the shores of Lake Superior. My admiration for Lake Superior, which I have come to affectionately call Big Blue, is often in the stark contrast between a turbulent lake to water gently lapping at the shore. My MN kin have been remembering the Edmund Fitzgerald and its crew members today. Nature is bold, beautiful, and sometimes daunting to the brave, adventurious souls who must have admired and feared the strengths of “Big Blue” in the same breath.