Posted on 11/10/2005 1:43:45 PM PST by apackof2
DETROIT (AP) — It has been described in many ways: Haunting. Comforting. Powerful. Educational.
But one thing is certain. Gordon Lightfoot's song, "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald," has kept alive the memory of 29 men who lost their lives on Nov. 10, 1975 when the ore carrier plunged to the bottom of Lake Superior during a nasty storm.
"In large measure, his song is the reason we remember the Edmund Fitzgerald," said maritime historian Frederick Stonehouse. "That single ballad has made such a powerful contribution to the legend of the Great Lakes."
Three decades after the tragedy, the Fitzgerald remains the most famous of the 6,000 ships that have gone down on the Great Lakes.
Many owe their awareness of the Fitzgerald's fate to Lightfoot, whose own initial knowledge of the sinking came from a magazine.
Lightfoot read about the Fitzgerald in a Newsweek article and used it as the inspiration to pen what would become one of his signature songs.
Clocking in at 6 1/2 minutes, "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" appeared on the 1976 album "Summertime Dream" and eventually made it to No. 2 on the pop charts.
The song remained on the charts for 21 weeks and has never really gone away. Lightfoot still performs it at concerts, including a show at Detroit's Fox Theatre over the summer.
Meeting him backstage that day was Ruth Hudson, whose son Bruce was working as a deckhand on the Fitzgerald when it went down. Lightfoot and Hudson have become friends over the years.
Hudson, who lives in North Ridgeville, Ohio, and saw Lightfoot perform near Cleveland the year the song was released, said the song has been therapeutic to the families of the crew.
"It's meant a lot. It's kept the men and the memorial to the men alive," she said. "I think it's been good for the families. They have felt comfort in it. I have talked to just about all of them, and I haven't talked to anyone who didn't like the song."
Lightfoot declined to be interviewed for this story, but he told The Associated Press in 2000 that "Wreck" is "a song you can't walk away from."
"You can't walk away from the people (victims), either," he said. "The song has a sound and total feel all of its own."
The structure of the song is simple: 14 verses, each four lines long, and the 450-plus words are carefully chosen and accompanied by a haunting melody.
The song tells the story of the Fitzgerald's fatal voyage, which began Nov. 9 in Superior, Wis., where it was loaded with 26,116 tons of iron ore and ready to set sail for Detroit.
A day later it was being pounded by 90-mph wind gusts and 30-foot waves.
Ernest McSorley, the ship's captain, radioed a trailing freighter, the Arthur M. Anderson, and said that the Fitzgerald had sustained topside damage and was listing. At 7:10 p.m., he told the Anderson: "We are holding our own."
A short time later, the ship disappeared from radar without issuing an SOS. After a few days, a vessel with sonar was able to locate the Fitzgerald only 15 miles from the safe haven of Whitefish Bay.
But Lightfoot's song does more than tell the story, it transports the listener on board the Fitzgerald that fateful night:
"The dawn came late and the breakfast had to wait/When the gales of November came slashing/When afternoon came it was freezing rain/In the face of a hurricane west wind."
And then the crescendo:
"The captain wired in he had water coming in/And the good ship and crew was in peril/And later that night when his lights went out of sight/Came the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald."
Several memorial events are planned to coincide with the 30th anniversary of the sinking, including a ceremony at the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum at Whitefish Point and a service at the Mariners' Church of Detroit.
And undoubtedly "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" will be heard and discussed.
"Any bit of literature, prose or poetry that magnifies the loss of loved ones is so dramatic. That is comforting to those people. That means that someone else is sharing your grief. We bear one another's burdens, so that helps," said Bishop Richard W. Ingalls of the Mariners' Church. Ingalls tolled the church bell 29 times the morning after the sinking.
"Gordon Lightfoot's song definitely has given it a life that seems not to end."
That's right! It's coming back to me now. There have been many theories, It seems your post is correct. I now recall the that the ship took on water and torpedoed to the bottom when it met a wave at a most unfortunate angle.
Ironically, that's one line Lightfoot got all wrong. The ship's regular cook was ill and couldn't make the voyage, so they sailed with a junior cook instead. To this day, the "old cook" is sometimes called "the only survivor of the Edmund Fitzgerald."
Did you sail Lake Superior?
Are you calling my mother a liar? She was a shy girl from a protected environment.
It really is amazing that something that large could disappear so quickly
Agreed.
Yikes. I think I would left that guy on the dock also.
The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they called 'Gitche Gumee'
The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
When the skies of November turn gloomy
With a load of iron ore twenty-six thousand tons more
Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty.
That good ship and true was a bone to be chewed
When the gales of November came early.
The ship was the pride of the American side
Coming back from some mill in Wisconsin
As the big freighters go, it was bigger than most
With a crew and good captain well seasoned
Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms
When they left fully loaded for Cleveland
And later that night when the ship's bell rang
Could it be the north wind they'd been feelin'?
The wind in the wires made a tattle-tale sound
And a wave broke over the railing
And every man knew, as the captain did too,
T'was the witch of November come stealin'.
The dawn came late and the breakfast had to wait
When the Gales of November came slashin'.
When afternoon came it was freezin' rain
In the face of a hurricane west wind.
When suppertime came, the old cook came on deck sayin'.
Fellas, it's too rough to feed ya.
At Seven P.M. a main hatchway caved in, he said
Fellas, it's been good t'know ya
The captain wired in he had water comin' in
And the good ship and crew was in peril.
And later that night when his lights went outta sight
Came the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.
Does any one know where the love of God goes
When the waves turn the minutes to hours?
The searches all say they'd have made Whitefish Bay
If they'd put fifteen more miles behind her.
They might have split up or they might have capsized;
May have broke deep and took water.
And all that remains is the faces and the names
Of the wives and the sons and the daughters.
Lake Huron rolls, Superior sings
In the rooms of her ice-water mansion.
Old Michigan steams like a young man's dreams;
The islands and bays are for sportsmen.
And farther below Lake Ontario
Takes in what Lake Erie can send her,
And the iron boats go as the mariners all know
With the Gales of November remembered.
In a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed,
In the Maritime Sailors' Cathedral.
The church bell chimed till it rang twenty-nine times
For each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald.
The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they call 'Gitche Gumee'.
Superior, they said, never gives up her dead
When the gales of November come early!
Time for our 3rd annual I love/Hate "Edmund Fitzgerald" discussion!
I like it, btw.
Particularly for people who didn't have a lot of money to hire a lawyer.
A colleague of mine at work about fifteen years ago was part of a circle of friends that were guitar players in central PA, apparrently Gordon had spent some time in that area years ago and used to play with them. They said he spent time in and out of aylums.
Another Fitzgerald connection, one of our crane operators has a brother who is a Navy diver. He was on a crew that dove on the Fitz, supposedly had a video shot of it that I was going to get to see, but it never materialized.
Yes, summer of 57 and 58 I sailed the great Lakes as quartermaster
I know it was a different event but when I hear those lyrics I always think of the ordeal the men of the US Navy endured then a typhoon hit the Pacic fleet in Dec of 1944:
From: Commander in Chief, U.S. Pacific Fleet.
To: PACIFIC FLEET and NAVAL SHORE ACTIVITIES, Pacific Ocean Areas.
Subject: Damage in Typhoon, Lessons of.
1. On 18 December 1944, vessels of the Pacific Fleet, operating in support of the invasion of the Philippines in an area about 300 miles east of Luzon, were caught near the center of a typhoon of extreme violence. Three destroyers, the HULL, MONAGHAN, and SPENCE, capsized and went down with practically all hands; serious damage was sustained by the CL MIAMI, the CVLs MONTEREY, COWPENS, and SAN JACINTO, the CVEs CAPE ESPERANCE and ALTAMAHA, and the DDs AYLWIN, DEWEY, and HICKOX. Lesser damage was sustained by at least 19 other vessels, from CAs down to DEs. Fires occurred on three carriers when planes were smashed in their hangars; and some 146 planes on various ships were lost or damaged beyond economical repair by the fires, by being smashed up, or by being swept overboard. About 790 officers and men were lost or killed, and 80 were injured. Several surviving destroyers reported rolling 70 or more; and we can only surmise how close this was to capsizing completely for some of them. It was the greatest loss that we have taken in the Pacific without compensatory return since the First Battle of Savo.
One cable station special I saw a few years ago came to the conclusion that the keel/hull failed completely about mid-way along it's length .
Another possibility was water got in thru open hatches, a wave hit and she dove for the bottom.
Unfortunately, some of the best artistic talent lives right at the edge of mental health. See my tagline for details.
Agreed. I heard it first years ago when I lived in Michigan. I'd never thought about guys going to sea or anything like that. Years later, I met a 20-something Michigan native who said they were taught about the event in Michigan history class, which I think is a good idea and honors the sailors' memories. The TV special was also very good.
I'm playing it now on an MP3. It is still haunting and can still bring tears to think what these guys went through, especially after seeing their families on the TV show.
I think the program I saw was of the theory, that, if I can explain this clearly, was that the front and rear of the ship were actually on the water, on big waves, and the middle might have been between those waves, out of the water, like a bridge standing, and the huge weight in the ship caused it to break in the middle. Something like that.
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