Rt. Hon. Paul J. Martin Freed
SATURDAY 1 pm. UPDATE: Rt. Hon. Paul J. Martin has been freed thanks to the efforts of 5 tugs and rising water levels. Tugs Ohio and Minnesota were on the bow, with the Ontario, Patricia Hoey and Tenacious on the stern. Once freed, the Martin turned downbound resuming its trip to Quebec.
SATURDAY NOON UPDATE: Five tugs are now on scene working to free the Martin. They are the tugs Ohio, Minnesota, Ontario, Patricia Hoey and Tenacious. All are Detroit-based.
ORIGINAL REPORT: Detroit, MI – A Canadian freighter that ran aground in the Detroit River on Friday will remain there until at least Saturday morning, a U.S. Coast Guard official said.
Petty Officer Omar Faba said the 738-foot motor vessel, known as the Rt. Hon. Paul J. Martin, ran “soft aground,” meaning it was still surrounded by water, in the vicinity of the Renaissance Center. The ship was stuck perpendicular to the shore of the Detroit River.
Faba said the vessel was not creating any threat of “injury, pollution or impact to the marine transportation system” and that low visibility Friday evening was hindering efforts to free the freighter.
Faba said Coast Guard personnel were closely monitoring the incident. Authorities will reassess the situation Saturday morning and work to refloat the vessel, he said.
The MV Rt. Hon. Paul J. Martin was traveling from Sault Ste. Marie to Quebec, Faba said. It wasn’t clear what the freighter was carrying or why it ran aground.
[The Detroit News]
No chorus? No problem: The improbable story behind Gordon Lightfoot’s beloved hit ‘The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald’
All of these were devastating calamities that no doubt upended the lives of the affected families for generations. But it’s pretty safe to say that the average person today is only familiar with the last incident. And for that, we can thank Gordon Lightfoot.
Recorded in December 1975 — mere weeks after the ship had sunk — and released seven months later, Lightfoot’s song “The Wreck of Edmund Fitzgerald” was an astonishing feat on multiple levels. It was a direct response to a current event that exuded the gravitas of a centuries-old seafaring fable. It’s a folk-rock song that doubles as a work of investigative journalism, providing a vivid dramatization of the ship’s doomed journey while humanizing the sailors whom the public only knew as a grim statistic, and voicing the grief of their loved ones. It’s a six-minute slow-motion shanty comprising seven novelistic verses and no chorus that still managed to be a chart-topping hit.
A half-century later, as horrible headlines clog up our newsfeeds every minute only to be swiped away and instantly forgotten, “The Wreck of Edmund Fitzgerald” stands as a crucial work of historical preservation for an incident that might have otherwise faded from collective memory.
For evidence of the song’s lingering impact, look no further than the New York Times’s non-fiction bestsellers’ list, where Ann Arbor, Mich., journalist John U. Bacon’s “Gales of November: The Untold Story of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” debuted last month. A thorough accounting of the events of Nov. 10, 1975, and an intimate portrait of the crewmen’s families still trying to make sense of the tragedy, Bacon’s book also devotes considerable real estate to the creation and legacy of Lightfoot’s song.
“Let’s be honest: without the song, there is no book,” Bacon told the Star in a recent interview. “There were 6,000 shipwrecks in the Great Lakes between 1875 and 1975 and everybody can name one of them — and we all know why.
“But whenever somebody would say to me, ‘Oh, I already know this story,’ trust me, you don’t. I didn’t know 95 per cent of what’s in this book four years ago when I started working on it — and I grew up on the Great Lakes. I was amazed by how little I knew about this story, including the song. I just assumed this guy was inspired to write a song and that was it. I had no idea that the creation of the song was very unlikely, the recording of it was very unlikely, and the success might have been the most unlikely part.”
The recording of a classic
It’s well documented that Lightfoot started writing “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” after reading Newsweek’s coverage of the disaster, but the story of its completion is a tale less told. Lightfoot’s song may centre on a meticulously researched, intricately constructed narrative, but from a musical standpoint, “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” is actually a triumph of on-the-spot improvisation.
“That was the first time we ever heard the song,” drummer Barry Keane said of “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, “it was the first time we ever played the song, and that is what’s on the record.”
After five days of rehearsals at Lightfoot’s Rosedale home in December 1975, the singer and his band booked a five-day session at Yorkville’s Eastern Sound Studio to record the songs that would form the “Summertime Dream” album. But “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” wasn’t on the to-do list; at that point, the song was just a skeletal sketch that Lightfoot would start fleshing out after the day’s work was done.
He’d start strumming this thing in 6/8 time,” drummer Barry Keane recalled, adding that lead guitarist Terry Clements and pedal-steel guitarist Pee Wee Charles would start working out parts to go along with it. “But as soon as Gord heard them play, he’d throw his hands up and say, ‘No, no, no — don’t worry about it. The song’s not finished, it won’t be on the album. We need to focus on the ones that will be on the album.’”
But when the “Summertime Dream” sessions wrapped up a day early, recording engineer Ken Friesen suggested that Lightfoot use the extra time (which was already paid for) to lay down the half-finished song he was so hesitant to share, if only to provide a rough outline.
Rick Haynes, who played bass with Gordon Lightfoot since 1968, said of the initial take of the song, “Oftentimes, that first rush of blood proves to be the best thing possible.”
“Very reluctantly, Gord said, ‘All right,’” Keane remembered. “Then he said, ‘Terry, Pee Wee — play those parts that you guys worked out.’”
But he never said a word to bassist Rick Haynes or Keane. “Just as Gord was about to count it in, I asked, ‘Gord, when do you want me to come in?’ And he said, ‘I’ll give you a nod.’
“So we got about a minute and a half into the song and I’m thinking, ‘We’ve got to be getting toward the end of the song — I think he forgot to cue me.’ But then we hit the break coming into the third verse and Gord gave me the nod. I did that big drum fill, and all of us played to the end of the song. That was the first time we ever heard the song, it was the first time we ever played the song, and that is what’s on the record.”
The band attempted a few more recordings of the track, but none matched the mercurial majesty of that initial, instinctual take.
As Haynes explained: “There was that first rush of blood — the instant response of musicians who are good enough to get through something without messing it up, but who were under pressure to come up with something. And oftentimes, that first rush of blood proves to be the best thing possible, and when you go back and try to improve on it, it just waters it down. Afterward, I just remember thinking, this song is a big deal — it’s way too long to be a single, but it’s going to be an awesome album cut.”
“Summertime Dream” was released in June 1976, with its typically folksy title track selected as the lead single. However, Warner Bros. Records CEO Mo Ostin noticed that “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” was getting played on more progressive FM radio stations and, at a Los Angeles meeting with Lightfoot and Keane, suggested it be promoted as the second single.
Keane recalled: “Gord and I are looking at each other like, ‘You know, Mo, you’re a very smart man, but are you really going to make a single out of a six-and-half-minute song about a shipwreck that has no chorus?’”
Ostin’s gut feeling proved correct: “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” went to No. 1 on the Canadian charts and No. 2 in the U.S. (where it was ultimately denied the top spot by Rod Stewart’s boudoir ballad “Tonight’s the Night”).
“I’ll never forget a concert we did in Kalamazoo, Michigan, at Wings Stadium, at the height of the record,” Keane said. “If that arena held 5,000 people, then there were 6,000 people in there. There were wire fences around the stage, and I will never forget seeing faces pressed up against those wire fences, trying to get close to the stage, and people just screaming. This was a big hit record, but it really hit home in a place like Kalamazoo, where we’re playing the song and meeting some members of the (sailors’) families. We weren’t just playing a hit song — there was a lot more emotionally to it, and that’s a feeling I never had before or since.”
Fifty years later
True to the song’s improvised origins and surprise success, the story of “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” has continued to evolve in unexpected ways: it’s hard to think of another 50-year-old golden oldie that’s proven to be such an evergreen source of Instagram memes.
And Lightfoot himself didn’t treat the song as some sacred, carved-in-stone text, but more like an online newspaper article that required periodic updating: as new information about the shipwreck came to light over the years, Lightfoot would modify some of the song’s more speculative lyrics in concert to ensure its authenticity. From those tentative first attempts in 1975 right up to his final performances before his 2023 death at 84, Lightfoot was committed to getting the story right, reaffirming that ”The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” was never intended to be some grand, self-edifying artistic statement for its writer, but a public memorial shrine for those directly impacted.
“The song mentions ‘the wives and the sons and the daughters,’ and they were always in the front of Gord’s mind,” Haynes said. “And he did it with the utmost respect, and did as much as possible to honour them.
“You know, Gord’s namesake in merry old England, the Lightfoots, were actually couriers that went from town to town to spread the news,” Haynes added. “And he was that kind of a guy. He told stories and he was very good at it.
“He was a very good journalist in the truest sense of the word.”
Bill
Whitefish Point area prepares for emotional tributes to Edmund Fitzgerald crew
As Nov. 10 marks five decades since the tragic loss of all hands aboard the SS Edmund Fitzgerald, communities near Whitefish Point are preparing heartfelt tributes
According to the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society (GLSHS), leading up to the Nov. 10, 7 p.m. private remembrance service for the 50th Edmund Fitzgerald Memorial at the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum at Whitefish Point, there will be other special events in the Paradise/Whitefish Point area that the public is invited to.
Friday, Nov. 7, 6:30 p.m. at the Whitefish Township Community Center at 7052 M-123 in Paradise.
The Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum (GLSM) will host an Edmund Fitzgerald speaker panel. Panelists will range from historians and surviving Fitzgerald family members to Shipwreck Society staff and a former engineer on the Fitzgerald. This is a free event, and seating will be on a first-come, first-serve basis. The event will last approximately ninety minutes.
Saturday, Nov. 8, 6:30 p.m. at the Whitefish Township Community Center put on by the Paradise community.
A round table discussion will take place. We will hear the accounts of the then-teenagers that were in Paradise and at Whitefish Point, the evening of Nov. 10, 1975. They will undoubtedly reminisce about their parent’s stories handed down over the years as well. We are also asking if you were blessed to be a “Bell Ringer” in the past, please come if you can, if you have a pin please wear it proudly once more.
Seating limited to 200, first come first basis. Public is welcome.
Sunday, Nov. 9 from 1-3 p.m. at Whitefish Point.
The GLSHS will release the second edition of its popular Edmund Fitzgerald publication, The Legend Lives On.
With an additional 48-pages of content, this richly illustrated book features historic imagery and artwork of “Big Fitz” during its working life and of this ship’s ongoing story across the years since Nov. 10, 1975. Authors Bruce Lynn and Christopher Winters will be signing copies of the book at this time.
Monday, Nov. 10 at 2 p.m. at Whitefish Point.
The GLSHS will hold an outdoor public remembrance service for the 50th Edmund Fitzgerald Memorial. The public event will last around 90 minutes. We will ring a replica bell 30 times and have different speakers, and play The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald live. This event is going to be emotional, touching and memorable. No tickets are needed to attend.
Please note: the parking area at Whitefish Point needs to be vacated by 4:30 p.m. to make room for the Fitzgerald family’s private evening event at 7 p.m.
Monday, Nov. 10 at 7 p.m. at Whitefish Point inside the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum.
A ceremony for family members only will take place at 7 p.m., which will be live-streamed for the public. Under no circumstances will the evening ceremony for the family members of the Edmund Fitzgerald be open to the public. The live-stream link of the evening ceremony will be made available prior to the ceremony via the website and social media channels.
Monday, Nov. 10, 5:30-9 p.m. at the Whitefish Township Community Center put on by the Paradise community.
The Community of Paradise will host the live-stream of the evening Memorial Service at Whitefish Point (which is closed to the public). Seating is limited to 200, first come first-served basis.
[Jim Lehocky]
[Sooleader]
For more information, please call: 800-635-1742, or head to the GLSM website by clicking here.
https://shipwreckmuseum.com/?utm_source=sooleader.com&utm_campaign=sooleader.com%3A%20outbound&utm_medium=referral
National Museum of the Great Lakes Remembers the Fitzgerald
Fifty years after the Edmund Fitzgerald tragically met its demise in Lake Superior, the National Museum of the Great Lakes invites you to Toledo for four powerful days of stories, music and reflection remembering the ship’s 29-man crew-many of whom called Toledo home.
[See the two-page flyer in the gallery.]
Mark 50 years since Edmund Fitzgerald sinking with historic cuisine, wreath laying
DETROIT, MI – From dining on authentic cuisine served on the ill-fated freighter to a solemn laying of wreaths on the water, the Detroit Historical Society is hosting a weekend of events to honor the 29 mariners who died in the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald nearly 50 years ago.
The museum is planning several opportunities, paid and free, to honor the Fitzgerald, which went down in a violent storm on Nov. 10, 1975, and is remembered in the Gordon Lightfoot ballad.
Rebecca Salminen-Witt, a spokeswoman for the Detroit Historical Society, said tickets are expected to sell out fast for a special brunch set for Sunday, Nov. 9, and the solemn wreath-laying ceremony on Nov. 10. Free events also are scheduled at the museum throughout the weekend.
“It’s important for people to learn about this history ― there’s a lot of it. And Detroit played a huge role in the maritime history of the state and in the whole country,” Salminen-Witt said.
Friday Nov. 7
The commemorative weekend kicks off at 11 a.m. with a book talk featuring Thomas Nelson, the author of “Wrecked: the Edmund Fitzgerald and the Sinking of the American Economy.”
Salminen-Witt said Nelson’s book takes a unique perspective on the ship’s sinking and how the loss of thousands of pounds of ore affected Michigan’s manufacturing economy, ultimately impacting the nation’s economy.
Register for the book talk here: https://www.detroithistorical.org/events/book-talk-wrecked
Detroit Free Press
Detroit Historical Society hosts several events for 50th anniversary of Edmund Fitzgerald sinking
By: Max White
(WXYZ) — The Detroit Historical Society is hosting a full weekend of activities to mark the 50th anniversary of the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald.
According to the society, the activities all take place at the Dossin Great Lakes Museum on Belle Isle, and will kick off on Friday, Nov. 7, with a talk by author Thomas Nelson, who wrote the book “WRECKED: the Edmund Fitzgerald and the Sinking of the American Economy.”
On Saturday, Nov. 8, curators and docents will host drop-in tours of the Edmund Fitzgerald exhibit on the lower level of the Dossin Great Lakes Museum. Also, the Great Lakes Maritime Institute will be there for information and merchandise.
Also on Saturday, the Livonia Amateur Radio Club will be in DeRoy Hall for the Edmund Fitzgerald radio broadcast, and a new pop-up exhibit will debut.
Sunday morning, the museum will host its first-ever Maritime Brunch, which will feature a chef-prepared meal directly from the Edmund Fitzgerald’s on-ship menu, along with a video presentation from Ship-to-Shore Chef Catherine Schmuck.
During the brunch, a new film will premiere about the Edmund Fitzgerald with experts from around the Great Lakes. Tickets for the brunch are available now.
Finally, on Monday, the society will host its 26th annual Lost Mariner’s Remembrance, which is a tribute to the sailors who were lost on the Great Lakes. The event takes place from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. and begins with a lantern vigil at the Fitzgerald’s bow setting. Officials say the event sells out every year, and tickets are available now.
Click to see Full story and videos: https://www.wxyz.com/news/detroit-historical-society-hosts-several-events-for-50th-anniversary-of-edmund-fitzgerald-sinking?sfnsn=mo&fbclid=IwY2xjawMsZ1VleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHi7V_IMl1KDLaV2aLwAgHT9l68-iG1GT4NPz0DBD_7FrGRv3vNimb9LJi74Q_aem_jJq4jLDiDZj4tCbMK3qspw
Split Rock lighthouse on Lake Superior to shine
beacon for Edmund Fitzgerald memorial ceremony
TWO HARBORS, MN – One of the most famous lighthouses on the Great Lakes will again be hosting an Edmund Fitzgerald memorial service this year, and the gathering marking the 50th anniversary of the freighter’s tragic loss is expected to draw thousands to the clifftop site.
Split Rock Lighthouse will host its annual event on Nov. 10, a half-century after the Fitzgerald sank in a violent storm off Whitefish Point at the southern end of Lake Superior.
At the service, all 29 names will be read aloud to the tolling of a bell. Then Split Rock’s beacon will be lit in tribute to those lost.
The Minnesota Historical Society will be hosting the event. The lighthouse, perched atop a high, rocky cliff, sits more than 130 feet above Lake Superior. It is one of the most photographed lighthouses in the United States.
“We’re just trying to provide a little place for memory and for remembrance and to really put into perspective the power of the lake,” site manager Hayes Scriven told Minnesota Public Radio recently. “So that’s why we think it’s very important for us to keep doing this.”
The Split Rock Lighthouse event is one of many taking place across the Great Lakes to honor the memory of the Edmund Fitzgerald’s crew. In Michigan, the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum at Whitefish Point will be holding a public remembrance event on Nov. 10, as well as a private ceremony for the relatives of the Fitzgerald’s crew.
The Mariners’ Church of Detroit also has memorial events planned for November. You can see the lineup here: https://marinerschurchofdetroit.org/edmund-fitzgerald/
[M Live]
Fitzgerald Memorial Plans Announced By
Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society
The Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society will hold an outdoor public remembrance service for the 50th Edmund Fitzgerald Memorial at Whitefish Point on Monday, November 10th, 2025 at 2 p.m.
PLAN AHEAD – WHAT TO EXPECT:
Outdoor Shelter: NO tent or seating will be setup for the outdoor public ceremony, as November can have volatile weather that would cause more harm than good. Check the weather forecast prior to traveling to Whitefish Point, and know your limits.
*(Seating will be provided for speakers and individuals ringing the bell.)
Parking: LIMITED parking is available at Whitefish Point. No RVs, Campers, or trailers will be allowed to park in the PAVED parking areas. Once paved parking areas are filled, be prepared to park along the shoulder of the road prior to reaching Whitefish Point.
No Shuttle Services: Be prepared to walk the distance from where you parked to get to Whitefish Point. Know your limits!
Museum Closed: The Museum will be closed to the public. Restrooms will be open.
Grounds Cleared: In order to make room (and parking available) for Fitzgerald families driving-in for the evening ceremony, daytime visitors will be asked to leave the grounds by 5PM.
A ceremony for family members only will take place at 7:00 PM, which will be livestreamed for the public. Under no circumstances will the evening ceremony for the family members of the Edmund Fitzgerald be open to the public.
The live stream link of the evening ceremony will be made available prior to the ceremony via our website and social media channels.
[Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society]
