DETROIT (WXYZ) — Monday marks the 50th anniversary of the sinking of the freighter S.S. Edmund Fitzgerald, which went down during a storm on Lake Superior claiming the lives of all 29 crew members on board.
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The Edmund Fitzgerald was built in Detroit and was the largest ship constructed at the time, measuring 729 feet in length. For 17 years, she made over 6,000 trips on the Great Lakes before her final voyage 50 years ago.
"The ship was built to be the biggest and the best and it was for the 17 years it was running," said Joel Stone, retired Dossin Great Lakes Museum curator.
On Nov. 10, 1975, the Edmund Fitzgerald departed Wisconsin bound for a steel mill in Detroit carrying 29 tons of iron ore. The freighter sank in a fierce storm 17 miles north of Whitefish Point in Canadian waters of Lake Superior.
"The Fitzgerald kind of sailed right into the middle of it, right into the sweet spot and was in the wrong place at the wrong time," Stone said.
The tragedy has become embedded in Great Lakes culture and maritime history.
"It's become part of the Great Lakes Culture of tragedy that we would probably put in the same category of the Titanic," Stone said.
Video below shows worker removing bell from the Edmund Fitzgerald shipwreck in 1995
Thomas Stretlien and John Gardner were visiting the Dossin Great Lakes Museum on Friday and remember where they were when the tragedy struck.
"It was a grim day. When I got home from school, I heard the Edmund Fitzgerald was sinking or had sank — it was pretty frightening," Stretlien said.
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Gardner was at the Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, when he received the news.
"We had to read the paper every day and reading about the loss of the Fitzgerald and the general thought was how can that happen because after all, it was just the Great Lakes," Gardner said.
This weekend, the Detroit Historical Society is hosting a special pop-up event at the Dossin Great Lakes Museum on Belle Isle to remember the Edmund Fitzgerald and the lives lost.
"The ship is sadly gone. The families have made their peace with it, but the rest of us all keep that at the forefront of our minds," Stone said.
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