That's the year that archaeology professors Mark Holley and Brian Abbot did a sonar search of the bottom of Lake Michigan. Then, in June, the search continued and several bodies were discovered but the wreck and the rest of the crew were never found. There was, however, one intriguing find that developed in the 1890s: Alighthouse keeper on Manitoulin Island discovered six skeletons. TIME STAMPS00:00:00 INTRO00:11:05 SUBMECHANOPHOBIA00:27:41 LAKE SUPERIOR00:41:38 SS KAMLOOPS01:30:00 OLD WHITEY01:53:30 KAMLOOPS SCUBA DIVER INTERVIEW02:27:35 FINAL THOUGHTSPlease go leave a comment on Curtis Lahrs Kamloops vlog and say that LGH sent you! It's said that some of the ships that met their end on the Great Lakes are condemned to keep wandering and the tales of those who've met the ships crewed by the dead are nothing short of terrifying. One of the only images of Old Whitey | Via Doug Bell / YouTube. He is typically known as Old Whitey, but you may hear some call him, affentionately, grandpa. If you would like to change your settings or withdraw consent at any time, the link to do so is in our privacy policy accessible from our home page.. Small for the era, the Kamloops was a scant 250 feet in length, 43 feet in beam with a 14 foot draft. Sometimes, he even touched them, but they say he never seemed angry just glad to have some company, if only for a little while. But sometimes, proof of something eerie shows up, and we're left to explain it again. Today, the whole English-speaking world knows the single element of the Edmund Fitzgerald saga that has won universal agreement, which is that the lake never gives up her dead when the skies of November turn gloomy. WebWhiteys corpse is found floating inside the engine room of the SS Kamloops, which sank on the Canadian side of Lake Superior in the 1920s and has never been removed. Usually a person who goes into the lake, they dont come back up, said Mike McFarlane of McFarlane Mortuary. Like another deep and cold lake, Lake Tahoe, it is true that the bodies of crew members involved in sinking ships frequently (but not always) remained in the vessel at the bottom of the lake; it was further true Lake Superior was unusually cold and bodies were sometimes preserved. She has been described as a sturgeon, a dragon, or a water cat and has even been depicted as having the shape of Lake Superior, but she's always credited with either protecting those who sail her waters or destroying them. The plane was flying over the triangle in 1950 when it was denied permission to descend. Doughty spoke to living relatives of the men who perished on that ill-fated voyage, and discussed features of the site preventing divers from visiting it. Depending on the damage to the ship, they could either clear a path through the interior or cut a hole through the exterior. The debate rolls on, like the waves on Lake Superior on a particularly tumultuous day. A February 2006 report in theTahoe Daily Tribune (Lakes depths hold many dead bodies: Officials report most corpses dont surface if lost in Lake Tahoe) concerned the discovery of an unidentified womans body in Lake Tahoe, which sits at the border of California and Nevada. And sometimes, sailors catch a glimpse of the W.H. That day was September 16 and if the tug captain wanted to live, they told him, he'd better leave. His body stiff and his skin white as snow, the nameless member of the Kamloops crew had floated inside the ship for fifty years, alone until the divers began to occasionally filter in. Pixelation, no. There are bottom feeders in all lakes, unless the pollution has killed them off, and at the time of the sinking, there would not have been the pollution in the Lake that there is now. Marie, Michigan, and Sault Ste. Its a little bit like makeing Ox tail stew, no matter what the temperatures the meat is still gunna fall of the bone at some stage. Thirteen ships sank during a single storm in 1913, unable to overcome white-out snows and 35-foot waves. They call him grandpa or old whitey, because the cold lake waters have bleached the preserved body a pale, ghostly white. His body was eventually found by Bruces Legacy in July 2018, 22 months after he had gone under. Hudson.. Sign up for a new account in our community. Northern Ontario Travel says that Lake Superior isn't the only lake rumored to have a centuries-old resident: South Bay Bessie was first sighted in Lake Erie in 1793. Old whitey is the nickname given to a deceased crewman of the ss kamloops, which sank in lake superior in 1927. While no one is quite sure what caused the Kamloops to sink, the few clues that were discovered paint a pretty horrific picture. I just want mom and dad to know my fate. She signed it, Al, who is dead.. The body in this case was fully submerged in a specific vessel, and it remained partly intact due to specific circumstances: It turns out that the frigid waters of Lake Superior had not just refrigerated farm equipment and foodstuffs, it had perfectly preserved one of the 13 crewmen who never made it ashore. And the video is pretty darn convincing when he zooms in, you can see a surprising amount of detail and what apparently looks like sails flapping in the wind. Old whitey, as he became known to divers, stands guard over Marie, Ontarioa distance Edmund Fitzgerald could have covered in just over an hour at her top speed. And its like doing it with a helicopter in a strong wind because of the Keweenaw current; theres theres a persistent current that flows from southwest to northeast along the Keweenaw Peninsula. Whiteys corpse is found floating inside the engine room of the SS Kamloops, which sank on the Canadian side of Lake Superior in the 1920s and has never been removed. According to the Manitou Passage Underwater Preserve, the Morazon sits above water in part because she ran aground on the wreck of another ship, the Water L. Frost. In the case of the Edmund Fitzgerald bodies, they all went down with the ship and never came back up. Per the Split Rock Lighthouse from the Minnesota Historical Society, at least 350 vessels are known to have sunk in Superior's icy depths. By the next day, the two ships were caught in a severe storm on Lake Superior, with near hurricane-force winds and waves up to 35 feet (11 m) high. Folklore was a common theme in pieces about the sinking of theEdmund Fitzgerald and its outsized presence in the legends around Lake Superior. However, a number of other factors hampered the recovery of the lakes dead, and Lake Superior was not a frigid vortex retaining all who drowned in or on it historically, crew members from other vessels washed ashore. WebDrowning " Old Whitey " is the nickname given to a deceased crewman of the SS Kamloops, which sank in Lake Superior in 1927. Overall, the Facebook post included three claims, two relatively straightforward and the third, less so: We were easily able to confirm that this claim is indeed true. That's kind of what happened in 2007, and underwater archaeologists are still scratching their heads. Lake Superior has also earned the title of being one of the Top 10 Most Haunted Lakes in the World. It was a cool July day in 1915, and the Eastland was getting ready to shuttle 2,573 people from Chicago to a park 38 miles across Lake Michigan. The ship laden with 1,000 tons of general cargo ran aground just south of South Manitou Island, where she still sits well above the water (pictured). On the night of December 6th, 1927, Lake Superior was in the grips of a violent winter storm, and the SS Kamloops was struggling to make its way through the waves, accompanied by the steamer shipQuedoc. His body stiff and his skin white as snow, the nameless member of the Kamloops crewhad floated inside the ship for fifty years, alone until the divers began to occasionally filter in. The reason why proves Lake Superior is, without a doubt, among the rarest and most unique bodies of water on the planet. In fact, Lake Superior has earned two foreboding nicknames: The Lake That Never Gives Up Her Dead and The Graveyard of the Great Lakes. Powered by Invision Community. One of those legends is that of Old Whitey. However, I love learning about the Edmund Fitzgerald. WebProstate Massage - Green Heaven Massage. Oosee added that even in shallow water where the last location of the missing person is known, recovery wasnt always easy for several reasons. In the middle of a particularly nasty gale, the captain of the Quedocspotted a dark mass rise up out of the waters, and quickly turned course, warning theKamloops, which was shrouded in the thick fog. Facebook. Layers of fat come to the surface of the skin, forming a chalky/soapy substance that hardens around the outside. The story goes that the ship's mascot, a massive black Newfoundland, was somehow sent tumbling overboard into the water. Althought there might not have been fish to munch old Whitey away, but what about the microscopic bactieria that I would think after neary 100 years would have made a bit of damage over time. February 6, 2008 in Cryptozoology, Myths and Legends. Should you fall in, even at this temperature, your survival time without a life jacket would, on the average, be less than two hours. He is typically known as Old Whitey, but you may hear some It came true, you're lookin' at it. According to Forbes, he was shooting footage for a music video when he saw something on the horizon: It was a tall-masted ship, reminiscent of a pirate ship. Maybe that's why the ghost of Grandpa is often seen walking along the sunken decks as though absolutely nothing is amiss. Web'Old Whitey' went down in 1927 U.S. Army Corps of Engineers/Wikimedia Commons One of Lake Superior's most well-known shipwrecks, immortalized in the Gordon Lightfoot song Found out that something strange can happen with bodies that are immersed in water for long periods. Even thoughSmithsonian Magazine notes that those in charge of the shipping companies knew this and warned legislators that the consequences of their new "safety" laws would be more deaths, no one listened. Then there were others who reported something even more frightening: that Grandpa would follow them as they made their way through the ship, and that he wasnt just a ghost he was physical. That passage illustrated the difficulty in reaching wrecks (and recovering bodies) from the bottom of Lake Superior: The IDS building, tallest building in downtown Minneapolis, is 792 feet tall. The area has proven deadly for a number of reasons, including that microclimate: The lakes are big enough that they have dangerous waves, storms, and currents just like the ocean, and that has led to tens of thousands of deaths. Memories of the Prairie says that the Western Reserve can sometimes be seen, too or, more accurately, heard. Fascinating stuff. They set out from Niagara on August 7, 1679, and the ship was still afloat in mid-September. Perhaps, he is just interested in the company after so many decades alone. TIL that Lake Superior is so cold that bacteria needed to cause a submerged dead body to float and surface is unable to grow. Login. Sorry bad pun! So ghost ship? Currents, a large surface area, extant debris, and depths were all cited as hindrances to the recovery of bodies even in shallow waters, and even when the last known location of an individual is known. Lake Superior contains roughly three quadrillion gallons of water (or, per our quick-and-dirty online converter math, approximately 11,356,235,352,000,000 liters.). The official record states that all of the ships crew were lost. bravo raw water pump. Also gone? All . However, Lake Superiors cold temperatures inhibit bacterial growth and the bodies tend to sink and never resurfaced. If the divers went to the wreckage, why couldn't they take the body with them? One of them is still visible: She's the wreck of the Francisco Morazan, and her story is a pretty perfect illustration of just how many shipwrecks there are in the Great Lakes. The holds of the Kamloops were filled with farm machinery once destined for the Canadian plains, but even the food was in incredible condition. By There's the SS Eastland, which didn't even make it out of port. On March 6 2021, a similar post appeared on Reddits r/todayilearned: On Reddit, the original poster (OP) linked to a February 2018 blog post, which concluded with a reference to the Gordon Lightfoot song The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, and adding: An old saying, Lake Superior doesnt give up her dead. is both folklore and fact. According to The Homestead, there are around 50 shipwrecks at the bottom of the Manitou Passage alone. The only trace ever discovered was a single life preserver, and since then, she's been seen so many times that she's called the "Flying Dutchman of Lake Superior.". These two parts seem very contradictory to me. SS Kamloops story elements are probably real (except for the body swimming around). There are certainly enough possibilities that have found their way to their final resting place beneath the waves. He would of had to have been frozen to still be in tact. Some mystery surrounds the sinking of the ship. Lake Superiors 3 quadrillion gallons are enough to cover both North and South America under a foot of water. Alice survived the initial sinking of the Kamloops and, before dying, wrote a note describing the wreck and how she survived, for a while, by making it to shore. Why? In March 2019, a separate r/todayilearned post was titled: TIL bacteria will feed on a decaying body underwater and create gas, which causes the body to float to the surface. Due to this, many bodies from shipwrecks, such as the Edmund Fitzgerald, have never been recovered. Glicher, her captain at the wheel, her fog whistle blowing. WebMeet Old Whitey, the Preserved Corpse of the SS Kamloops, Lake Superior's Most Haunted Shipwreck The ghost of Old Whitey, the preserved corpse of the haunted SS Kamloops Considering the depth and temperature of the waters, the dive was reserved for only the most experienced, which meant that relatively few explorers got to wander through sunken bowels of the Kamloops. Now that you know the sad fate of those aboard, lets head back to Old Whitey. Can't find much info on it and it seems like it might just be an urban legend. Bodys generally will not float in . !function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],p=/^http:/.test(d.location)? So much of the idea that bodies in Lake Superior dont float appeared tied to the poetic descriptions by Lightfoot, and general advancement of folklore about the lakes conditions. WebKamloops (Official Number 147682): The Kamloops was built in 1924 at Middlesbro, England by the Furness Shipbuilding Company for the Canada Steamship Lines. When a toxin is locked up in the food web, it cant sink into the sediments, evaporate into the air, or flow out with the water.. Email Us. Scary For Kids, Today, Grandpas well-preserved corpse is still floating in the wreck of the Kamloops, where he spends most of his time occupying the engine room. More than 200 bodies found at Indigenous school in Canada. Cold water and slow decomposition were not the sole reason recovery was complicated recovery missions were described as involving precise calculations and variable conditions: Chris Oosee, a lieutenant with the Grand Traverse County Sheriffs Office, said without eyewitnesses, it can be hard to pinpoint where somebodys last location was before slipping under the waves. Coupled with a relative lack of life at the bottom of the lake, even things like clothing and leather shoes, still stored neatly in crew cabins, were perfectly preserved, lending a dreamlike eeriness to the exploration of the sunken ship. During that process gases such as methane, nitrogen and oxygen are produced but the type of gases formed depend on the type of bacteria in the gastrointestinal tract, Sohn said. Surprisingly, the once-ghost ship was found on August, 21st 1977. In a 2019 article, MPR reported that not only did the ship sink to that depth, but some bodies were recovered: On Sept. 19 [1901], the [Duluth News Tribune] reported that given the lack of wreckage, the report that a ship foundered was probably a mistake., But the next day, news reports made clear there was no mistake: A fishing boat found floating wreckage including two masts, one painted black and the other yellow matching the Hudson. Thanks to Marco A. for this blogstonishing suggestion! She disappeared in 1901, and in the 1940s, a tugboat captain came across a rusty ship covered in sludge. He was said to be seen on the decks of ships that were going to sink, and according to Maritime History of the Great Lakes, he appeared on the deck of the Isaac G. Jenkins just before she sank in 1875and again on the deck of the Mary Jane just before she mysteriously disappeared in 1881. It sounds to me like a mixture of history (the true story of the wreck) and fiction. However, that post linked to a blog post, and the blog post didnt say what the title said it did: LAKE SUPERIOR BODIESThere an 350 shipwrecks in Lake Superior and an estimated 10,000 people have died in the icy waters, but as legend says, Lake Superior never gives up her dead. Divers in 2019 located a different shipwreck theSS Hudson, which sank in 1901 at a depth of 825 feet below the surface. That may or may not be true, but we cant be sure because we cant go down that far, said Van Arnum, a member of the El Dorado County Sheriffs Department and former coroner. I haven't heard this one. Since Lake Superior only ever reaches a few degrees above freezing at its depths, the icy water acted a kind of natural refrigerator. Ripy House, Haunted by a Whiskey Baron, is a Real-Life Scooby-Doo Mansion, Ghost Hunting for Answers: Help Solve the Mystery of Shrewsbury Prison, one of Britains Most Haunted Jails, Beware the Deadly Demon Truck of Seven Hills Road, Marylands Strangest Haunting. Today there is no black or white -- Citing a September 2020 recovery effort involving shallow water, Oosee cited visibility and general debris as a factor complicating the search for bodies: It was so rough in area; the sonar worked well, but the visibility was less than a foot in the water, Oosee said. "Ye old shipped matey be starving for a good rum by now", The Vampire Lair The search at the Kamloops site that once was an orchard was prompted because of a discovery of a childs rib bone. One of Lake Superior's most well-known shipwrecks, immortalized in the Gordon Lightfoot song "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald," happened in 1975, according to the Shipwreck Museum, when all 29 men aboard the freighter called the Edmund Fitzgerald (pictured) were lost. In the preceding summer [1994], family members of the Fitzgeralds crew were incensed to learn that photos had been taken of dead people on the sunken ship and were likely to be published. It was thought that there were no survivors, but six months later bodies were found on a nearby island. Many mysteries remain about exactly what caused the accident. By - November 27, 2022. She's called the Witch of November. Lake Superior contains three quadrillion gallons of water; Lake Superior is the size of South Carolina; Lake Superior is so cold that growth of bacteria is inhibited, and bodies in Lake Superior do not float or surface. It seems that the harder it is to access a haunted location, the scarier the ghost stories tend to be, and they dont get much creepierthan that of Grandpa, the spirit haunting the submerged wreck of the SS Kamloops. They were looking for shipwrecks, but according to Milwaukee Magazine, they found something stranger: a line of stones that looked very deliberately arranged and reminded them of Stonehenge. The hatch theory was put forward by the Coast Guard, rejected by a National Transportation Safety Board investigation and revived by the NTSB. The cold water of Lake Superior does not allow bacteria to grow like it would in warmer water. In months such as August and September the surface temperature runs between 65 to 70 degrees. Continue with Recommended Cookies. No wreckage has ever been found. This is 100% urban legend with the only truth being the SS Kamloops Eww poor thing! En route to a steel mill near Detroit, Edmund Fitzgerald joined a second taconite freighter, SS Arthur M. Anderson. According to Milwaukee Magazine, Lake Michigan is usually pretty easy to navigate, but over the course of hundreds of years, well take the Thomas Hume. TheKamloops, on the other hand, was nowhere to be found. (That's a storm building over Lake Erie in the picture.). Some mystery surroun, Well. After European colonization, the great lake became a central hub for trade and commerce (via the University of Missouri-Kansas City). It all started with a ship heading through Welland Canal, says GWVM. It said that she was blamed for dangerous conditions on the water and over the years, the sinking of around 400 ships were blamed on the sea dragon. For this reason, it's said that "Lake Superior doesn't give up her dead," referring to those unfortunate enough to slip beneath the surface of the vast lake, or according to the folk singer Gordon Lightfoot, "Superior, they said, never gives up her dead." A rendering of the SS Kamloops wreck "Old Whitey"'s final rest place is pictured above. Wherever there are boats, cold temperatures, and deep water, though, such as in Lake Superior, shipwrecks are bound to happen. As established by the meme, Lake Superior is an extremely large body of water, which means conditions are rarely uniform across the lake; conditions also vary by season. She left Chicago on November 27, 1960, and sailed into driving winds and snow. Could our disrespect explain why these creatures have sunk so many ships? Despite how frightening a visit from Grandpa was, there was never any reason for alarm. Divers in 2019 located a Although that information was presented for the living (and was important in terms of safety and Lake Superior), it also alluded to shallow bays and beaches which were overall warmer than the depths of the lake. However, Lake Superiors cold temperatures inhibit bacterial growth and the bodies tend to sink and never resurfaced. Did Princess Diana Lose Her Royal Protection? WebMeet Old Whitey, the Preserved Corpse of the SS Kamloops, Lake Superior's Most Haunted Shipwreck The ghost of Old Whitey, the preserved corpse of the haunted SS Kamloops shipwreck, has been scaring divers in Lake Superior for decades. Manage Settings Twitter. Everyone's heard of the Loch Ness Monster, and while Nessie might be the most famous, she's certainly not the only lake monster. She disappeared in 1892. The second ship turned back, worried about clouds on the horizon. It doesn't mention the body in the engine room though. The stone structure was only submerged by about 40 feet of water, so they sent a team of divers down to see what they could see (via ZME Science). WebI'm afraid the more recent local dive management might have a prohibition against taking close up photos of poor old Whitey's face and body. Michigan State Police Sgt. Copyright 2023 Apple Inc. All rights reserved. (Bacteria operating in warmer waters generate enough gas to make dead bodies float after a few days. Other times, he appears curious and even follows divers around as they search the ship. Creepy, sure, but Grandpa can do even better. One commenter stated referenced an article posted in the thread comments explaining how bodies are preserved in Lake Superior, but the blog post linked in fact only described one very famous partly-preserved corpse in the wreckage of the SS Kamloops. Seems odd to me that a body from 1927 would still be intact. Weatherbug says that some years are worse than others. No one was hurt, though the ship was declared unsalvageable. Things went from bad to worse when the dog was crushed in the lock's gate traffic was stopped until they could remove the dog's body, and people? Shortly after 7:10 p.m., Edmund Fitzgerald suddenly sank in Canadian (Ontario) waters 530 feet (88 fathoms; 160 m) deep, about 17 miles (15 nautical miles; 27 kilometers) from Whitefish Bay near the twin cities of Sault Ste. Content about Lake Superior and bodies that never surfaced almost always referenced the remains known as Grandpa or Old Whitey, as was the case in a May 1996 Baltimore Sun item: Hard-core experts aboard Royale Diver may now take the plunge to the islands most eerie treasures. It retained this status for fifty years, until it was discovered at the bottom of Lake Superior, in nearly perfect condition, just off Twelve OClock Point on the north coast of Isle Royale. Zenith City says that on stormy nights, some sailors claim to see the Bannockburn, a ship that disappeared in 1902. Only a few people have headed into the depths of the lake to see the actual shipwreck. A 2008 article about a 1995 expedition to theEdmund Fitzgerald (roughly 20 years after it sank) addressed eventual protection of the vessel and why dives to it were controversial, and it began: Before it was illegal to dive to the infamous ship, two men pulled off the deepest shipwreck scuba dive in Great Lakes history. The Hume continued and disappeared. sounds interesting. Richard Capling said that things dont always stay put when they go under, and there are many objects in the lake that can look like something to investigate. But even they admit it's just a theory, and it would be a rare occurrence, given the time of year. And to the west? S.S Kamloops sunken in Lake Superior with holds a preserved corpse, nicknamed "Old Whitey". To view the purposes they believe they have legitimate interest for, or to object to this data processing use the vendor list link below. It's the Edmund Fitzgerald, but as famous as she is, no one knows why she sank. You need to be a member in order to leave a comment. McFarland through treacherous waters when he decided to get some rest. Visit https://www.venterrafarms.com and enter "HAUNTED15" at checkout for 15% off your order + free shipping on all CBD products.Lake Superior is considered to be one of the most haunted lakes of all time due to the insanely high number of unrecovered shipwrecks and bodies that litter the lake floor. only shades of grey. There are several bodies there -- in the story it's not an old wreck -- and as he moves through the ship he stirs the water and the bodies of the drowned sailors are drawn into his wake and move along behind him.
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