The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald...

Crew of the Edmund Fitzgerald
Michael E. Armagost 37 3rd Mate
Frederick J. Beetcher 56 Porter
Thomas D. Bentsen 23 Oiler St.
Edward F. Bindon 47 1st Asst. Engineer
Thomas D. Borgeson 41 Maintenance Man
Oliver J. Champeau 41 3rd Assistant Engineer
Nolan S. Church 55 Porter
Ransom E. Cundy 53 Watchman
Thomas E. Edwards 50 Second Assistant Engineer
Russell G. Haskell 40 Second Assistant Engineer
George J. Holl 60 Chief Engineer
Bruce L. Hudson 22 Deck Hand
Allen G. Kalmon 43 Second Cook
Gordon F. MacLellan 30 Wiper
Joseph W. Mazes 59 Special Maintenance Man
John H. McCarthy 62 First Mate
Ernest M. McSorley 63 Captain
Eugene W. O'Brien 50 Wheelsman
Karl A. Peckol 20 Watchman
John J. Poviach 59 Wheelsman
James A. Pratt 44 Second Mate
Robert C. Rafferty 62 Steward
Paul M. Riippa 22 Deck Hand
John D. Simmons 63 Wheelsman
William J. Spengler 59 Watchman
Mark A. Thomas 21 Deck Hand
Ralph G. Walton 58 Oiler
David E. Weiss 22 Cadet
Blaine H. Wilhelm 52 Oiler

And all that remains is the faces and the names / of the wives and the sons and the daughters.

Incredible song. I doubt I ever heard it but once, maybe, before I moved to Ohio. And somehow being around people who knew the Great Lakes firsthand really clicked it into place for me. Can't think of very many other songs based on a real-life tragedy that so well balance the banality of it all with a real honoring of the dead. It's not exploitative and it's not bombastic, but nor does it dial things down so much that it loses the essential fact of a bunch of working people who died for no good reason, whose families never got to see them again. It's sincere, I think.

And man, that guitar part.

Some of you guys might dig this one. This cover is by the Down-Fi which features Craig Bell from Rocket from the Tombs (and others) on vocals and bass.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ioIiDLA_Zi4&feature=youtu.be

as the big freighters go, it was bigger than most

Dee-troy-yut

Saw this really cool site put together with more about the story, timeline and context:

https://noaa.maps.arcgis.com/apps/MapSeries/index.html?appid=858309daa74f4e6ebf81f32d128f7ed8

Dee-troy-yut

Was playing this earlier today and when I heard this I was thinking about the poll we did about how Robert Plant thinks "Darlene" is pronounced.

In case you were wondering, the ship Edmund Fitzgerald was named after a president of the Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company of Milwaukeehttps://t.co/rB7exPIZgH pic.twitter.com/3Rd3udHCeV

— Michigan's Past (@MichiganHist) November 10, 2017

Ever since my first trip to UP a couple years ago and a stop at Whitefish Point, I've found myself thinking about this more and more often and playing the song every year on November 10th. Actually reading a book about shipwrecks on the Great Lakes right now!

Dee-troy-yut

i think this may be a canadianism, although i'm not sure why

totally a Canadianism, you get real used to it watching Wings games on CBC

lol my main example is penguins color guy bob errey

totally a canadianism, Mickey Redmond has been dropping that pronunciation for decades on Red Wings broadcasts

it's really too bad Gordon Lightfoot couldn't have worked the Canadianism of “organization” into the lyrics

pulled the record out of the shelf today and the sleeve was so busted up the vinyl fell right through. a fitting tribute

Laura Cantrell covered the song.

There are good things about the song but its length and the depressing repetitiveness of the melody make it approach dudness

hold on now

Waiting til the day after to post that kind of challops, can't decide if it's respectful or cowardly

this song is perfect, end of sentence end of paragraph

45 years ago the SS Arthur M. Anderson was trailing the #EdmundFitzgerald before it sank in an intense storm. Tonight, it entered the Duluth canal in a snowstorm. It had to make a second go at the entry due to low visibilities from the snow. #wx pic.twitter.com/vkPwWgawK5

— NWS Duluth (@NWSduluth) November 11, 2020

thought this was cool to see last night

one of the few sings that literally makes my neck-hairs stand up

Listening to this again, and came across a semi-recent uptempo cover from the Headstones - guessing they're one of those "world famous in Canada" groups like the Rheostatics/Tragically Hip?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y8LBkYjniTU

GALE WATCH
ISSUED: 10:20 AM NOV. 4, 2022 – NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE
...SMALL CRAFT ADVISORY REMAINS IN EFFECT UNTIL 4 PM EDT THIS
AFTERNOON...
...GALE WATCH REMAINS IN EFFECT FROM SATURDAY EVENING THROUGH
LATE SATURDAY NIGHT...

* WHAT...For the Small Craft Advisory, Highest gusts up to 25
kts from the southwest and highest waves around 4 feet. For
the Gale Watch, Highest gusts up to 40 kts from the southwest
and highest waves around 6 feet possible.

* WHERE...Whitefish Bay (U. S. Portion)/Whitefish Point to Point
Iroquois MI.

* WHEN...For the Small Craft Advisory, until 4 PM EDT this
afternoon. For the Gale Watch, from Saturday evening through
late Saturday night.

* IMPACTS...Strong winds can cause hazardous highest waves which
could capsize or damage vessels and reduce visibility.

PRECAUTIONARY/PREPAREDNESS ACTIONS...

Mariners should consider altering plans to avoid possible
hazardous conditions. Remain in port, seek safe harbor, alter
course, and/or secure the vessel for severe wind and highest
waves.

&&

Also the cook should try to feed the fellas before it gets too rough, just a suggestion.

Goddam gales of November!

Idle thoughts:

1. Why hasn't there ever been a death metal band called Gales of November?
2. Gotta admit, "gale" is a pretty innocuous term for a potentially hazardous weather event.

https://static.fusionmovies.to/images/character/beDAy6JbMc1UJ5yV7x0N0jywP5RqcCVj1hLTHYDSSyvArN3FaZ-KSFPwx_RUS03rVhW3J3E2cu7ehlCjmdQqjXgEZQmhuU6Rn1mPSG-_dMg.jpg?1

don't we have a thread like "words that were only ever used in one hit song"? this has got to be the king of that thread

(^ Gale associated with a hazardous weather event, if that wasn't abundantly clear)

To address frogbs's post, pretty sure you are right about "Gitche Gumee" and probably several other words. It's worth noting that Billy Joel's "Storm Front" reached #6 on the album charts but the title song was not a single.

just singing the song off the top of my head...Chippewa, Gitchee Gumee, gales, Fitzgerald, freighter, peril, capsized, Whitefish Bay, Lake Huron, mariners, maritime?? wonder how many other Top 10 songs had any of those words in them

Had to teach a music class on this a few weeks ago, and two of the girls (related) said their uncle worked on the ship...which didn't make sense to me, because I thought there were no survivors and he was still alive. I thought maybe he helped load cargo onto the ship or something like that.

Word(s) that only ever appeared in one (hit) song, ever.

try it and see! doing a round of Control-F first is always appreciated. i will say that in general that thread has been less concerned with proper nouns and especially place names, which would cut down Lightfoot's contributions here...

(^ Gale associated with a hazardous weather event, if that wasn't abundantly clear)

It is now! Had to look it up, never knew Dorothy's last name was Gale.

I remember how evocative it was - "fellas it's been good to know you" and the bell ringing (shudders). Pulling this type of song off in the seventies is some feat.

One of most chilling shipwrecks after the Titanic...they were being followed by another ship when it just disappeared in front of them.

If you've spent time on the upper Great Lakes in winter or late Autumn, or seen those massive freighters, it really resonates.

If you like this song you have to check out a pair of old documentaries on YouTube...working the big freighters was an enviable job - the scenery, the cameraderie...the way it contrasts with the sailors' fate.

Surprised it has not been a feature film (or maybe I'm wrong).

Frogbs, I had a suspicion that the Paul Simon song "Duncan" (with "I left my home in the Maritimes") charted, but wasn't too 10. As it happens it peaked at 52.

The Robbie Robertson song "Evangeline" also includes "Maritimes" but it looks like neither the Band's version nor Emmylou Harris's ever charted.

never knew Dorothy's last name was Gale

She is Dorothy Gale in the movie. Which is funny given the whole tornado thing.

The situation in the books is more complicated. Her last name seems to have been an afterthought.

i was also preparing to bring up Duncan on the other threas :D. not a huge hit but some kind of successful. apparently the live version enjoyed regular airplay for a time? i guess that's why it's on Greatest Hits, Etc. i always thought it was just continuing the bad tradition of live-version substitutions from the earlier S&G hits album.

I M Losted, another source of lore on this topic is the very good John McPhee book Looking for a Ship.

I live very close to Lake Michigan and yeah I’m reminded of this song all the time

Doctor Casino, I am continually charmed by your diligence in pursuing narrow avenues of lyrical trivia. You are doing important work. Keep it up.

as life goes on, i grow more and more accepting of the things I'm good at

(and thank you!)

Maybe it's because I heard this endlessly on the radio as a four-year-old, but I never go out of my way to put this on. Here's my favourite Lightfoot shipwreck song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I4cAnMZc79U

My favourite shipwreck song of all is "The Scorpion Departs but Never Returns" by Phil Ochs:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbiJR-bqSfw

this is a great thread but i wish we could make it so you can only post to it on 10 november

Spent some of my childhood years growing up in the UP and there was this one time I got to take a plane ride back from Escanaba with a little league teammate and his dad who flew. Before the dad landed, he took us over our local bay and the Superior water was so clear you could see countless shipwrecks at the bottom of the bay.

I was at a bar in Superior, WI once and a guy told me his dad was a cook on the ship and went down with it, I choose to believe him

I was searching the tubes for versions of Red Iron Ore (a fantastic tune in its own way for fans of the Great Lakes and/or sea chanties) and came across this double-shot

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxUTteCudL8

Super nice day out for this anniversary, Gales of November nowhere to be found yet.

https://www.tiktok.com/@taylagoers/video/7159338279358319914

ngl, I like when 11/10 is colder and drearier for my annual walk along Lake Michigan listening to this, doesn't hit the same when it's sunny and 75

Did Lake Michigan steam like a young man's dreams?

On second thought, never mind.

I always read "the islands and lakes are for sportsmen" as sideways insult of lake michigan, like it's the little kids play area versus ICE WATER MANSIONS which is so much more teenage goth

Superior's the real real, though

Remembered!

that delivery of "Does any one know where the love of God goes/When the waves turn the minutes to hours?" gets me everytime.

The Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum’s annual Edmund Fitzgerald memorial event will be offered as a livestream ceremony this year. The event, scheduled for Friday, November 10, 2023 (7pm), is closed to the public, but will be available on this livestream link that you can watch from your device of choice. The buildings of the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum at Whitefish Point, are not open to the public on November 10, 2023.

In addition, the Michigan Maritime Museum (www.michiganmaritimemuseum.org) of South Haven, MI, will host a viewing of the Shipwreck Museum’s Edmund Fitzgerald livestreamed memorial service at their facility.

https://shipwreckmuseum.com/shipwreck-museums-48th-anniversary-edmund-fitzgerald-memorial-event-will-be-a-closed-event-livestreamed-in-2023/

Can't recall if I have posted it here or not but the Shipwreck Museum at Whitefish Point can be a spoooky, ominous place. Also really cool and informative.

it's interesting that there are so many shipwreck museums around the globe. Other than scattered memorials I can't think of any plane crash museums though. I guess plane crashes are mostly blamed on mechanical/human error, rather than acts of God, and so are seen differently?

Co-worker of mine in her 60s telling me how they'd have this activity at the skating rink in the late 70s where row of boys would face a row of girls.

One would skate from one side to the other, make their pick and then skate down the line between the two rows. Sometimes, the pair would go off together, but more often than not, the person picked would come back to make a selection from the other side of their own.

The most cringe and anxiety producing skating game I had heard in awhile with the cherry on top being — "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" would be the song that would play throughout all of this because it was six and a half minutes long.

There are grandmothers in suburban St. Louis today who likely flinch when those intro chords strike over the Smooth AM Hits XM channel.

I like the idea of a plane crash museum. I've personally lost several friends & acquaintances to plane crashes and only one to a shipwreck (or technically, lost at sea). I guess wind shear used to be an act of god that crashed planes but now there's technology to prevent that.

at the risk of being incredibly rude

I've personally lost several friends & acquaintances to plane crashes

do you live in alaska or are you related to paul wellstone?

No, just weird bad luck I guess. Especially for those people who are gone now.

xp can you elaborate on alaska = more plane crash prone?

not sure that it's more plane-crash prone, exactly, but most of it can only be reached by plane. an alaskan politician needs to fly a lot more than an east coast politician. and that's how ted stevens finally died.

also flying into juneau is apparently so harrowing (like, you'd better be lined up perfectly or you won't be able to clear the mountains on an aborted landing) that they've spent 70 years talking about moving the capital

bruh

i am innocent (of whatever you are suggesting)

A little technical, but this is a good analysis of the weather situation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1FE69h-mdk