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Edmund Fitzgerald life ring is on the auction block at Detroit gallery
A significant Great Lakes maritime relic, an orange ring buoy with white stenciled lettering “S. S. Edmund Fitzgerald” and four black reinforcing bands holding a nylon rope, is up for auction at Detroit’s Dumouchelle’s gallery. It is being offered along with with a wooden plank from Lifeboat 1 from the Edmund Fitzgerald.
On November 18, 1975, 10 days after the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald, a 27 year old man named Larry Orr found this life ring and plank from the ship’s Lifeboat 1 . While walking 30 to 40 feet above the shoreline of Lake Superior he noticed each leaning against a large tree trunk in a wash that had likely been created by high water surf during the storm.
The life ring and plank are both believed to have come from the Edmund Fitzgerald’s No. 1 lifeboat. In 1988, Mr. Orr loaned these relics to the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum in Paradise, Michigan until health and financial concerns necessitated its sale at public auction.
Starting bid is $11,250.
Find out more here: https://live.dumoart.com/online-auctions/dumouchelles/life-ring-from-the-s-s-edmund-fitzgerald-and-plank-to-lifeboat-1-ca-1958-1-pc-8478091
Leftover pellet inventory being removed from idled Dearborn blast furnace
According to waterfront reports, unused iron ore pellets at the idled Cleveland-Cliffs plant at Dearborn, MI, on the Rouge River, were being loaded aboard the steamer Wilfred Sykes over the weekend with mobile conveyor belts and front-end loaders.
Cleveland-Cliffs idled some operations at the Dearborn plant this past summer, citing “the current reality of weak automotive production in the U.S.” as the reason for laying off about 600 employees. At the time, the closure was expected to be a temporary measure to rebalance capacity and improve efficiency.
The pellets will be taken to Cleveland.
If the Soo Locks ever failed, America’s steel production would collapse in days.
Nearly all of America’s domestic production of iron ore from Minnesota and the Upper Peninsula moves across Lake Superior and through this single choke point in Michigan. If the Locks shut down, the steel for our cars, bridges, skyscrapers, railways, and shipyards would grind to a halt almost overnight.
During World War II, FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover called this shipping route the “jugular vein” of America’s war production. President Franklin D. Roosevelt even created a special military district to guard it — the only one of its kind — because a single attack here could have crippled the Arsenal of Democracy.
And they’re still that critical today.
That’s why the $3 billion New Lock at the Soo is being built right now — preparing this single point for the next century of American industry.
[Only in Michigan-Brian Calley]
[See photos in Gallery below]
