University Place

[gentle music] - Norman Gilliland: Welcome to University Place Presents.

I'm Norman Gilliland.

The demise of the Edmund Fitzgerald has been well documented in records from that fatal day in 1975, and of course, in Gordon Lightfoot's popular song from the following year.

While some mysteries remain as to exactly what happened to the ship on that fatal November day, seeing the wreck in the wider context of its times will give us some idea as to what happened to it.

With me is Thomas M. Nelson, the author of Wrecked: The Edmund Fitzgerald and the Sinking of the American Economy, co-authored with Jerald Podair and published by the Michigan State University Press in 2025.

Welcome to University Place Presents.

– Thomas Nelson: Great to be with you.

- I have to ask, originally, with so many other people interested in the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, what sparked your interest?

- Well, I think it comes back-- it goes back to two things.

First of all, there was a personal experience at a very young age, and being a child in the Midwest in the 1970s and the 1980s, I took a trip to the Upper Peninsula with my dad.

It was a motorcycle trip.

It's in the preface.

And it goes and talks about that trip there.

But going up there, I went to the Valley Camp Museum.

In the Valley Camp Museum, there are a number of artifacts from the wreckage, and one of them was the lifeboat.

And it, you know, I mean, it's a pretty impressive relic.

And for a seven-year-old walking up to it, I mean, the stern is just pulled apart as if a can opener had just ripped it open.

And it was almost like, you know, walking up to it, you know, four feet, five feet.

It it felt like this monster was just, you know, you know, just, like, grabbing me.

And so, it was this image that was seared in my mind and stayed there for a long time.

Then about 15 years ago, I was running for office for lieutenant governor, and I was doing a fundraiser in Milwaukee.

And there was a gentleman there that explained to me the economic ecosystem of how the Fitzgerald carrying ore was at the center of this economy.

And since manufacturing was a big part of the economy in the 1960s and the 1970s, the Fitzgerald was absolutely definitional.

And over the last couple of years, I kind of played with those two concepts.

And the result of that is this book.

- Now, there have been other wrecks, of course.

I'm thinking in particular, there have been a lot of wrecks over the years, but not too long before, in 1958, there was the Carl D. Bradley, which had a similar experience on the lakes.

Breaking up, heavy weather and all that and a loss of 33 lives with two survivors miraculously.

Why the Fitzgerald?

Why has it captured the imagination so much?

And of course, other than Gordon Lightfoot.

- Talking to a lot of people, I think they'll say that if there wasn't the Gordon Lightfoot song, we wouldn't be talking about this, and I probably would not have written this book.

But I think that there is a lot more to this story than just a song.

And if you think about what makes a really good movie, you're going to have, you know, compelling characters, compelling drama, and a really good soundtrack.

And those three elements came together to make this incident as popular as it has been.

I also think, too, different from the Carl Bradley, it's important to look at a historical context.

So, in this case, it's the 1970s.

1975 was probably not this country's finest hour.

And earlier that year, you had the fall of Saigon.

The year before that, you had Watergate.

You also had double-digit inflation, on and on.

And I think the American people were looking for heroes.

And if you recall, what happened with the Fitzgerald is right away, it wasn't about a wreckage.

It was about a mystery because people just didn't know what happened.

It was on the lake at one moment and the next, it was gone.

And so, it wasn't for another 24 to 48 hours that people realized that it had sunk.

And so, I think you combine those things, which is those elements where later on, you have a very popular song, you have this mystery from the very beginning, which is a little bit more different than your typical wreckage.

And those three elements coming together made this such a fascinating story that has piqued seemingly everyone's interest.

When I went around doing book talks, I mean, people were coming in-- You know, people were coming out from the woodwork.

I mean, they had stories, they knew somebody.

They had heard the song, they loved the song, read a book and so forth.

- Let's start looking at the vessel then.

Who, first of all, was Edmund Fitzgerald?

– Thomas: Edmund Fitzgerald was the CEO of Northwestern Mutual, and Northwestern Mutual was the company that paid for the construction of the ship.

So, Northwestern Mutual owned the ship.

Oglebay Norton was the company that operated the ship, and that was kind of unusual.

Usually, there was more vertical integration with the steel companies, so they went all the way down, owning the equipment, the vessels, and so forth.

But you had this dynamic with the Fitzgerald where it was owned by one entity, in this case Northwestern Mutual, and was operated by another entity, in this case Oglebay Norton.

Northwestern Mutual entered into what's called a triple net lease with Oglebay Norton, which basically absolved them of any liability if anything were to happen.

And if there's one company that knows how to write insurance policy, make sure that that's gonna happen, it's going to be an insurance company.

And so, that was the case there.

So, Oglebay Norton, they had the responsibility to make sure that this ship was in good condition.

But they didn't-- They didn't really treat it like their own ship because it wasn't their own ship.

And so, the dynamic here was Oglebay Norton treating it like a rental.

They didn't have the same incentive structure that, for example, the Arthur Anderson had, which was owned and operated by U.S.

Steel and-- - Norman: We'll get into that ship later.

- Yes, yes, exactly.

And so, that's how-- That's how Edmund Fitzgerald fit into this.

Northwestern Mutual had nothing to do with the steel industry.

But as an insurance company, they had very healthy reserves.

And so, they chose to put it into a ship.

- And another part of the historical connection, I would think, would be that this was when the Soo Locks were put through, and they made this ship as big as possible with what, just a foot of leeway... - Yeah, right.

- ...to get through the locks.

And so, whenever we hear, "Oh, the biggest ship ever built," you know, we kind of have vibes right away that a little hubris might be involved.

[both laugh] - Yeah.

And so, it had a number of nicknames, including Queen of the Lakes, The Mighty Fitz, the Toledo Express because it went from Minnesota to Toledo, Ohio.

That was its traditional route.

And it was the biggest ship for exactly one year.

Because a year later, there was someone else that came out and built a ship that was one foot longer.

- What were the dimensions of it then?

- It was about 700 feet long and it had 21 hatches.

And so, within the hatches, there were three holds.

And so, the three holds had the ore that was divided equally.

And that was important.

We can get into it later.

And all told, it was certified for about 26,000 long tons.

That number is also significant because there were a number of times, particularly in the late 1960s, where the ship was carrying a lot more than 26,000 long tons.

And that goes to the night in November of 1975, where you had this vessel that was not in great shape, because the company that ran it did not have the incentive to keep it in good working order.

You had oversight entities that were certifying it as seaworthy, and you had a company that was trying to push the ship as hard as possible, as deep into the season as possible.

And so, late '60s and the early '70s, if you're doing 30,000 long tons, that's 20% or 25% above what should be capacity.

- Not to digress back too much, but the Bradley was the same thing.

Tended to be overloaded and overworked.

- Right, exactly, exactly.

- And was there no concern at this point that pushing all of these parameters, including into the gales of November, would be dangerous for a crew?

- Very dangerous.

And there were a number of crew members that knew the ship was not in great shape, that going deep into the season was not a good idea.

And part of my book, a big part of my book, talks about what I like to call the 30th crew member, a guy by the name of Red Burgner.

He was the cook on the ship for the 1975 season up until about September or October.

He had a doctor's note.

He had a medical condition.

And so, he took the rest of the season off.

And so, he was someone who knew the ship very well.

He had been on the ship for ten seasons.

He had wintered on it.

So, he knew this better than anyone.

And he knew it was in bad shape.

He had inspected the hull and the ballast tanks, and at one point, he actually took an executive from Oglebay Norton down into the hold to show him what kind of condition it was in.

So, it was very well established that the Fitzgerald was not in good shape.

And going back to how there was hubris about the ship because it was so large, there was kind of this myth that the ship was in very good condition, that it was the Mighty Fitz, that it was indestructible, which sounds a lot like another shipwreck story.

Which of course is the Titanic.

- Right.

- But I think they have it reversed.

And I think one of the reasons why there has been this false narrative about the Fitzgerald is that it seems that the narrative of the Titanic has been grafted onto the narrative of the Fitzgerald.

So, as we know, the Titanic had a ship that was in great working order.

It ran into an iceberg because that's what the captain did.

- Brand-new ship.

- Brand-new ship.

But what happened with the Fitzgerald is you had a very experienced, well-seasoned captain who had been in the lakes for about 30 years, and he was doing everything right.

He was doing his job well, but they didn't have a ship that was in good shape.

So, it was the opposite of what happened with the Titanic.

- Did it have compartments that could be broached and still keep afloat?

- Now, that's a good question because the union that represented the crew members, the United Steelworkers, had made a really big issue about how the bulkheads were not impermeable and that if you hit high seas and the ship was banging around, it was possible for the taconite ore to slide into another hold.

So, there were 21 hatches, and the 21 hatches were divided 7, 7, and 7.

So, there were three holds.

And it was very important that you had close to the same weight in each of the three areas so that it would be stable.

– Norman: For balance.

– Thomas: Right, but if you're, you know, banging around on the waves in the Great Lakes, and that's a lot different than you're at sea where there's kind of like these nice rolling waves.

Here, you know, in the Great Lakes when you hit a really bad storm, which happens all the time in November and December, if you go that far into it, that it was just beating up on the ship.

And so, it was very possible, likely that the holds were running into each other, and so the taconite ore was sloshing into the front compartment, you know, perhaps back to the stern and so forth.

And the union had said, "Look, you know, we need to have stronger material "so that it doesn't-- "the weight doesn't shift toward the bow or toward the stern "because that's just going to compound problems, especially if you're in a storm."

- Make it impossible to control.

- Exactly, exactly.

So, that had been established.

The industry refused to push for, to accept regulations that would have a more impermeable block, a bulkhead between the three compartments.

- Refused to accept them.

- Mm-hmm.

Well, not refused to accept them, though.

But there was a lot of pushback from the industry.

They just did not want to do this because it was going to be more expensive.

It would take time to rebuild.

And then, you're losing time.

And so, the goal was to get as many trips in as possible, to carry as much weight as possible.

And that was particularly the case with the Fitzgerald.

- And to make as many trips as possible.

- And to make as many trips as possible.

So, it starts sometime in April, go into November, and sometimes all the way into December.

- And during these trips, we do tend to, all of us, I guess, underestimate just over the course of how many years this ship was in service, the beating it took from trip to trip rather than any dramatic event.

Just constantly getting beaten.

And you mentioned the waves.

And we can look at the shapes of the Great Lakes, which are designed to kill ships.

– Thomas: Yes, that's a good way to put it.

– Norman: Because the waves all pile up in these narrow ends of the lake, and the waves come much closer together than they do in the ocean?

- Yes, yes, yes.

- So, you could actually be riding on the crest of two waves at once?

- Exactly, yeah.

And so, you know, if you're looking at a vessel like the Fitzgerald, which is 700 feet long, it's very narrow, and you have 26,000 to 30,000 long tons, and because of the waves, because of the weather, they're not evenly distributed anymore.

And it just makes the situation even worse.

And so, it's not really accounting for the kind of weather and the conditions that you're gonna have on the lake, which makes it more imperative that you have tighter regulations that are gonna make sure that the structure itself is more sound, that the bulkheads are gonna be stronger, and that the inspections will be a little bit more... - Rigorous.

- ...professional and more rigorous, and enforced too.

- What about the steel?

- The steel, the quality, supposedly, according to some of the people I interviewed, was not the best, which is kind of ironic because the carrying it-- - In terms of carrying it.

- Yeah, exactly, and taconite ore-- Pure iron ore had been almost completely mined and exhausted after World War II because of the demand for ships, for tanks, and so forth.

And so, they were limited with this taconite ore, which was probably about 60% pure iron ore, and it wasn't the highest quality.

And going back to the problem with the taconite that is sloshing among the three holds, because it's taconite ore, about 40% of it is sand silica.

And so, that absorbs water.

So, now you have the weight is increasing by, like, 40% or so forth.

So, you didn't have the same quality of ore.

And what you were carrying was even more susceptible to bring on and hold more weight.

- Sailors are perhaps understandably known for being superstitious.

Tell us about the launch of the Fitzgerald.

[Thomas laughs] - Okay, well, two things happened.

Mrs.

Fitzgerald, who had the honor of christening it, took about three or four hits before the wine bottle smashed.

– Norman: Broke on the bow.

- Yeah, exactly.

So, that wasn't good.

And then supposedly, that when it was launched, it made such a massive wave that one person who was in the audience died from a heart attack.

It was that intense.

And the cover of my book shows that launch.

And it really is something.

– Norman: And it almost took out a pier, too?

– Thomas: Yes, yes.

And so, you can see by looking at the cover, you know, there really wasn't a lot of oversight.

I mean, this is a massive ship unlike anything else that's been in the lakes before, and that's not a big pier.

And there's a lot of people around that.

So, it didn't seem safe at all, and it wasn't.

– Norman: Took it on a shakedown cruise, which would be, I guess, pretty typical.

But would this have been when, in June?

- So, it was built in 1957, 1958, but it was launched in the spring of 1958 for that season.

– Norman: So, obviously not the conditions it would encounter in November.

– Thomas: No, no.

- So, what is its working route for the Fitzgerald?

- It goes from Silver Bay, Minnesota to Toledo, Ohio, hence the nickname Toledo Express.

And it was operated by Oglebay Norton.

And so that was the route it took.

Now, on November 9 and November 10 of 1975, it didn't leave Silver Bay for Toledo.

It left Superior for Detroit.

Now, that wasn't because Oglebay Norton was taking a load from Superior and taking it someplace else.

November 9 and November 10, and people don't really talk about this, the Fitzgerald was actually carrying not for Oglebay Norton, but for National Steel.

There was this mutual aid agreement that the steel companies had, that if they had a load of ore in the upper lake and they needed to get to a steel mill, but they didn't have the boat, the vessel, to take it, they would tap the resources from another company.

So, in this case, it was National Steel making an arrangement with Oglebay Norton, and that is very relevant because the captain was not taking the same route that he would normally do.

But there was actually two things.

And as shown on this graphic, two things happen.

One, he was not taking it on the traditional route.

And then second of all, he modified the route because of the storm system about halfway through Lake Superior.

Instead of taking a straight shot down to the Soo, the ship hugged the North Shore, just in case.

If the weather got really out of control, which it did, they would be closer to shore to bring it into safe harbor, which did not happen.

So, he was on a completely different route than what he was used to, and that route itself was being changed up.

And at the time, the maps, the charts that they had in the pilothouse were about 50 years old, and the bottom of the lake is going to be changing... - Norman: Changing.

- ...over 50 years, which has a lot to do with this incident, because one of the prevailing theories is that the ship ran aground at the Six Fathom Shoal.

And so, that could have been because the charts were not dated, I mean, they were outdated, or it could have been that the captain was not consulting the charts.

And the culture, the mentality in the pilothouse is that there was complete deference to the captain, and the captain was not gonna be told how to sail the ship from anyone.

That included whether it was the Anderson... - Including another captain.

- ...whether it was the first mate or second mate, the wheelsmen.

And they knew the lake, and so they usually didn't consult charts either, let alone weather equipment and so forth.

And so, you go to this question about what was working, what was not working.

But there's also this element of the culture for which a lot of these captains were sailing a ship a lot like a dad would drive the minivan or the station wagon.

Of course, he would never stop for directions or consult the map.

And it was the same kind of mentality.

- What was the draft of the Fitzgerald?

How much water did it take to float it?

- Let's see.

Sometimes, the clearance would actually go down.

The draft would be about ten feet.

And so, usually I think it's between, like, 15 or 20 feet.

But because it was allowed to, it was certified to take on more and more weight, which it should not have been, it was getting lower and lower.

And so, there was really only ten feet distance.

So, think about that.

If you're playing basketball in the front yard, from Lake Superior to the top of the Fitzgerald deck is only the height of a basketball hoop.

Now, if you are smooth sailing, that's not that much of a concern.

But if you have rogue waves that could be potentially coming through at 40 or 50 feet, you have very choppy waters, not just November 9 and November 10, but throughout the fall and into November and December, like, that is just not safe.

Like, you are not gonna have that ship around for that longer.

- Tell us about the captain.

- Captain McSorley was known as a rough weather captain.

So, he had the reputation.

He was a company man, and so he knew that any moment, any day that the ship was not on the lake was one more day that the company was not making money.

And so, he made it a priority to get the ship on the lake and get it from the upper lake to the lower lake as quick as possible.

And so, he took chances.

There were a number of sailors that were with him on the Fitzgerald, as well as sailors that were with him on different crews in different ships, that he had that reputation.

But he wasn't reckless.

So, there's this kind of fine line between kind of a cowboy of a captain and someone that is just being completely reckless.

He knew what he was doing.

He knew that the ship was in bad shape too.

Going back to Red Burgner, the gentleman who was the 30th crew member who wasn't on the ship, of course, in November of 1975, he was deposed in 1977 in front of attorneys for two of the families, as well as representation from both Northwestern Mutual and Oglebay Norton.

And he spilled the beans.

And one of his-- Part of his testimony was talking about how Captain McSorley was a rough weather captain and how he had made this off-color comment that he didn't care what happened to the Fitzgerald after 1975 because he was going to retire after 1975.

He just needed to get one more-- He just needed to get one more load down to the lower lakes.

- What was the relationship between the owner, the company, and also those people certifying the ship being safe?

- Well, this is... If you think back to the Great Recession in 2008 and 2009, part of the reason why we had a financial meltdown is that there was a very cozy relationship between the regulatory agencies, Moody's Investor Services, for example, and Goldman Sachs.

And so, the company that was certifying whether or not an investment, a financial instrument, was in fact sound, was the same company that was being paid by the company that it was overseeing.

The same thing happened with the Fitzgerald and the shipping industry in general.

There was the American Bureau of Shipbuilding or Shipping that inspected and certified those ships to be seaworthy.

And if they're getting paid by a company who is getting paid by steel companies to haul as much taconite ore as possible, as long as possible, as deep into the season as possible, okay, that doesn't really make for a good arrangement.

- Conflict of interest?

- Conflict of interest.

So, what happened to the Fitzgerald in 1975 is a lot like what happened to the financial houses in 2008 and 2009 with the Great Recession.

- And as far as the financial incentives.

Was there a financial incentive for the captain?

- Oh, absolutely.

So, the captain-- - But not the crew?

- No, the crew reported to the captain, but it was the captain that reported to the company and had the incentive structure to run the ship as hard as it can, as deep into the season as possible.

So, Captain McSorley and other captains had the incentive from the company.

So, that was the relationship between the captain and the company.

But that was not the case with the crew.

The crew, I shouldn't say at the mercy of, but it was the crew that reported to the captain and not to the company directly.

- How did McSorley feel about going out on November 9?

- That's a good question.

I think, you know, based on the Bergner testimony, based on people that knew McSorley, I don't think it was ideal being out in November.

He was very close to retirement, but he took pride in his work, and he wasn't gonna be told that he couldn't sail, and he was gonna show his crew and certainly his boss that a little bit of bad weather on Lake Superior in November wasn't going to stop him.

He was that close to retirement.

He had been on trips before for which the weather was not cooperating.

He may not have had crew members that were top notch either.

And so, he was ready for this, or he thought he was ready for this.

And keep in mind, he had been on the lakes for about 30 years.

- What was his trajectory then?

Let's look at the map and see.

But this is different from the way-- the route he usually took?

– Thomas: Yes, right.

So, the route that he would normally take would be from Silver Bay, which Silver Bay, Minnesota, which is closer to Two Harbors, which is where the Arthur Anderson left.

But you can see with the red line that the Fitzgerald went, you know, straight to Ontario, Canada, and then went down to the Soo.

And that was deliberate because of the weather.

So, normally if they were carrying for National Steel, it would not have taken that exact, that same route, nor would it have taken that route if they were sailing for Oglebay Norton.

So, that is instructive.

There isn't a third line that shows its normal course, but trust me, it would have been a lot different than that.

You know, coming down here from the Fox Valley, you know, I took, you know, 41 to 26 to 151.

Now, I could have skipped 26, kept on going to 151 in Fond du Lac.

- Right, yeah.

- I would be okay, all right.

So, he took a different route, which was much different than coming from the Fox Valley down to Madison.

And on Lake Michigan, even the slightest changes and the course corrections they have to make is a pretty big deal.

And this was a radical departure from the route he normally would have taken.

- Which he was not as familiar with.

- Exactly, now, was he going to admit that he wasn't familiar with it and that he had to stop and asked for directions?

Of course not, and so that made things worse.

- What was the forecast for November 9?

- The forecast, it was going to be... It wasn't gonna be easy weather.

They knew that there was a system that was coming up from the southwest.

It was a panhandle, coming from the panhandle.

So, you had a warm front that was going to collide with a cold front coming down from Canada.

And so, that was going to be a bad thing.

And they had been through bad weather before, but it wasn't going to be as bad as it turned out to be.

The weather was really bad, but it wasn't to the point where it was completely unusual.

And keep in mind, too, the Fitzgerald was not the only ship that was on the lake that night.

You had the Arthur Anderson, which had been behind the Fitzgerald by about ten miles.

And that was important because the weather was coming from the west-southwest.

And so, the weather would hit the Anderson before it reached the Fitzgerald.

And so, Bernie Cooper, who was the captain of the Anderson, served as the weather forecaster, the weatherman for McSorley because of his position relative to the Fitzgerald.

So, you put those things together and you can kind of see how they were close to each other.

And if you look at Lake Superior, if you're on a normal lake, I mean, another lake, and they are ten miles apart, well, you are on completely sides of a lake.

But this is the second-largest lake in the world, so relatively speaking, if you wanna scale it down, they're basically on top of each other.

And in addition to that, you had the Sykes as well as the Ford.

So, you have four ore ships that are on Lake Superior, and three of them come out unscathed and another one sinks.

So, why is it that you have four ships that are kind of close to each other, three of them survive, one of them sinks?

And of the three, the Anderson was still on the lakes as recent as two seasons ago.

And I believe, based on the research, that a big reason why is that the Fitzgerald was not seaworthy.

That's why the Fitzgerald sank in the same storm that the Sykes, the Anderson, and the Ford were in.

Those three ships have something in common, something very important.

And this hasn't been talked about either.

They were owned and operated by the same company.

So, Anderson would have been U.S.

Steel.

Sykes would have been Inland Steel.

And Ford would be the Ford company.

And so, those were ships for which the owner and the operator were the same.

And so, they had a very clear incentive structure to make sure that the ship kept up.

And that was not the same structure for the Fitzgerald.

- It would be interesting to see how they would have fared if they had taken-- Were they all taking the same route that the Fitzgerald took?

- The Ford had sought shelter, had gone closer to shore, and so, and-- But the Ford was coming from the lower lake.

And so, the only thing that the Ford had was ballast.

So, the Ford had ballast, and it was a much smaller ship.

And yet, that was the ship that almost volunteered to go back out in the storm to find the Fitzgerald.

If you look at the radio transmission between the Anderson and the Coast Guard after the Fitzgerald disappeared, so to speak, there is reluctance on the part of Bernie Cooper.

He does not want to go back out into the storm to find the Fitzgerald.

He does not want to risk his ship.

He doesn't want to risk the lives of his crew members.

And he certainly doesn't want to lose an entire ship for the company that he works for.

You add those together and you can see, how it just doesn't make a lot of sense why the Fitzgerald sank and the other ships didn't sink.

They were close to each other and the Ford came in and tried to find the Fitzgerald.

Bernie Cooper was reluctant to go back into the storm.

And so, these ships were pretty close to each other.

If they weren't close to each other when the Fitzgerald sank, they were in the general vicinity.

And given the kind of system that was coming up from the panhandle, this was not a storm that was localized in one small area on the lake.

This had an effect all over that included the other three ships.

– Norman: Did the forecast suggest early on at least that this big storm was going to be going south of their course?

- It wasn't, right, right.

So, there were two things.

It was projected not to go as far north as it did.

And the Fitzgerald, McSorley wanted to make sure that he was doing what he could for the situation, which was to try to hug the North Shore.

So, they were expecting the storm to be bad.

If they weren't expecting the storm to be bad, he would have had a route that wasn't going as far north as he did.

– Norman: They were all headed for the Soo Locks?

– Thomas: Yes.

– Norman: And with that wind from the southwest, once they start turning toward the locks, they must have been rolling ferociously.

- Oh, yeah, yes, yes, yes.

And so, the way that I look at why it sank differently than most authors is I kind of look at it as a 15-round boxing match where it seems like everyone is focused on the very last round.

What happened around between 7: 00 and 7:30?

Was it the system coming up from the panhandle?

Was it because the ship ran aground at Six Fathom Shoal?

Was it because the hatches weren't secure?

All of those factors played into why the Fitzgerald sank.

But they were proximate causes.

They weren't the underlying cause.

My book looks at the first 14 rounds.

How there was mismanagement.

There wasn't the type of business model that incented maintenance.

There, of course, was not adequate maintenance done.

The design was not as good as it could have been.

The material used according to some people was not high quality material.

The oversight was lacking.

It was a cozy relationship, perhaps a conflict of of interest.

And so, what's happening is the Fitzgerald is getting beat up really bad in the first 14 rounds.

It goes in the 15th round, November 10, 1975.

It's on the ropes.

And you have the storm system at that point of the night.

Plus you have perhaps going aground at Six Fathom Shoal.

The hatches may or may not have been secure, but that was not the fault of the workers.

Absolutely not the fault of the crew members.

We can talk about that as well.

But what happened between 7: 00 and 7:30 on the night of November 10, 1975, that was the last punch, the knockout punch that did in the Fitzgerald.

So, I believe that it was only a matter of time before the Fitzgerald sank.

The reason why it sank is it simply was not seaworthy.

- Conversation between captain of Fitzgerald and the captain of the Anderson, how did that go?

- It was cordial, it was professional.

There was really no way of knowing, based on the-- their voice, the cadence, inflection, whether or not there really was trouble.

Bernie Cooper was very careful not in offering advice, offering unsolicited advice about how McSorley should be sailing his ship.

But Bernie Cooper was asking very important questions.

He was asking the type of questions that I think would make McSorley think, "Okay, should I be chucking down?

"Should the ship not be going as fast as it should?

Should I get closer to the shore?"

And so, Bernie Cooper, I think, did a really good job.

He was a veteran captain, he knew about the culture.

He knew he could not push McSorley too hard, but he asked the questions.

He provided the information that was available to McSorley to make the best possible decisions at the time.

Reading the transmission and listening to the transmission, it's very difficult to tease out exactly how McSorley felt.

You could listen to it and say, "Well, here's a guy that's under control."

Now, he could be speaking in that manner because he really did think things were okay, or he could have been speaking in that manner because he wanted to keep the pilothouse as, you know, as settled down as possible.

And I think it was the latter.

I think that he knew that he was in rough shape, that he had been taking in water ever since he got close to the Six Fathom Shoal.

I put a lot of weight into that theory because Bernie Cooper, to the day he died, he believed that it ran aground on the Six Fathom Shoal and that it was taking on water.

And that wasn't-- That wasn't an opinion that he formed after the fact.

That was real time because McSorley was talking about how it was taking on a list.

And so, that suggests that some of the cable lines were down, the transoms were down, and it was taking on water, which would mean that it's absorbing water because the taconite being part sand silica.

And so, Bernie Cooper had a pretty good understanding.

He had a pretty good sense that it was taking on water.

And he tried communicating that to Captain McSorley.

Captain McSorley came within 15, 17 miles of the Soo and thought he could just punch in hard and get there to safety, but it didn't happen.

- What do we know of as terms of while the Fitzgerald was still afloat, what was breaking?

- There were a few things that happened.

They thought that they were taking on water.

McSorley thought he was taking on water.

Cooper thought that the Fitzgerald was taking on water just because it was listing.

And it was taking on a lot because the cable lines had snapped off.

And if you think about how the top of an ore ship looks, on both sides, you have these, you know, these steel cable lines that are about as thick as a wrist, and sometimes, rarely, one might snap off.

Once in a blue moon, two will snap off.

But it's unheard of that three were actually gonna snap off.

And that's exactly what happened with the Fitzgerald.

So, McSorley, who knew the ship very well, I would think that he had a sense that this thing was falling apart.

He knew that it was in bad shape.

He was gonna retire soon.

It was really bad weather, but he just thought that he could get that last 17 miles.

- Which ordinarily would take, what, about an hour?

- Yes, yes, yes, yes.

And so, he was, you know, he was trying to push this thing hard.

He was making the distance between the Anderson and the Fitzgerald was growing and growing and he could see the finish line.

He was running out of gas, the wheels were coming off, but he thought that he could cross the finish line, but he didn't.

- What about the role of the Coast Guard in all of this?

- Ah, the Coast Guard.

So, the Coast Guard was the entity that allowed the ship to continue to sail, even though it was in very bad working condition.

I think that that's been very well established.

But the Coast Guard was also the ones who were on point to do the rescue.

And it was almost-- It was just a comedy of errors.

I mean, they really act like Keystone Cops that night.

And they act that way because on the lake, even though everyone knew that this was going to be a big storm, that November was a season where there were a lot of shipwrecks going back 100 years, 150 years, that the closest craft, boat, that it had was in Duluth.

And so, it would have taken this cutter about 21 hours to get from Duluth to the scene where the Fitzgerald disappeared.

There was an aircraft in Traverse City, which was about an hour, an hour and a half as the crow flies.

But just as it was about to take off, they realized that the flares were not there.

And of course, if you're going to search for a boat that's missing in a bad storm at night, you're gonna need flares.

Once it gets to about where they think the Fitzgerald disappeared, half the flares weren't working.

And people will say, "Well, it doesn't really matter because the ship was lost.

There wasn't a rescue."

That might be true.

But because the Coast Guard did not have the adequate equipment, you know, in that part of the lake, that's the reason why the Coast Guard pushed the Anderson very hard to go back in.

If the Coast Guard would have been better equipped, if they would have had a vessel closer to the Soo, they may never have asked the Anderson to go back in.

And by going back in, yes, there was not just one ship that sank, but you could have had another ship sink as well.

And that was because the Coast Guard was not prepared.

- You would think that given the nature of the Great Lakes and the size of the Great Lakes, that the Coast Guard would have positions... - Exactly, absolutely.

- ...around the lakes rather than way over in Duluth.

- Absolutely, especially in-- Exactly, especially given that this is the lake where you have, you know, the worst weather, you know, the worst weather.

And the implications are the most severe on any Great Lake.

And I mean, just think about that.

I mean, you're like 17 miles away from the Soo, and the closest point is 21 hours ago.

So, the time it took the Fitzgerald to get from Superior to that point would be about as long as it would take the rescue ship to get there.

And so, it didn't get there until the evening or late afternoon of November 11.

- You have to wonder what an aircraft could do anyway, other than dropping flares... - Right.

- ...to know where it was before it sank.

- Correct.

- I mean, they couldn't do any kind of rescue.

- Yes, that's right, and so if-- So, that was important to have that equipment ready to go for the Anderson because the Anderson did go back in.

If you had some flares, you might be able to see a little bit.

So, having the equipment ready to go was important.

And because the Coast Guard was ill-prepared for a rescue for a search in that part of the lakes, it jeopardized the crew of the Anderson.

And I think Bernie Cooper and his crew were very fortunate that it was called off and that it either missed the worst of the storm, or, you know, people kind of came to their senses thinking that we don't wanna-- We lost one ship.

We don't wanna lose another one.

- Fitzgerald had radar, though.

- The radar, both the radar were down.

So, they were on two separate circuits.

But because of the weather, as luck would have it, or, you know, unlucky, both of the radar were down.

And so, the only way that they had any eyes on the lake was through Bernie Cooper.

And it was good that the Fitzgerald wasn't to the west because the Fitzgerald would be getting the weather before the Anderson.

So, it was absolutely crucial that the Anderson was as close to the Fitzgerald as possible and was being able to get a good read on the weather before it hit the Fitzgerald.

One of the theories is called the Three Sisters rogue waves.

That supposedly that there were rogue waves that would-- There's been a record of such waves on the lake, that were as high as 40 or 50 feet that came through and gave the knockout blow to the Fitzgerald.

There was testimony that the Anderson saw a formation of rogue waves, and because it was only ten miles apart, it's very possible that those rogue waves could have hit the Fitzgerald.

- So, the Fitzgerald really doesn't even know exactly where it is anymore?

- Exactly.

I mean, they had a sense of where they were because they were, you know, they had the chart.

And so, someone was keeping track of that that way, but-- - Just paper charts.

- Right, right.

But it's important to emphasize that McSorley and Bernie Cooper were in close communication contact throughout that evening.

So, Bernie Cooper was only the only way that McSorley knew where he was on the lake, outside of, you know, maybe a gut sense or a sixth sense since he had been in the lakes for many years.

But Bernie Cooper was his eyes and ears that night.

- Were the men on the Anderson in particular, hoping that they could somehow, when they went back out, get to the Fitzgerald in time to do a rescue?

- It's possible.

- I mean, because recovery wouldn't have been any point in that at that juncture.

- Yeah, that's a good question.

It's really unclear who in the Anderson besides the people in the pilothouse really had an understanding of the conditions of the weather and of the lake, and then, what the fate was of the Fitzgerald.

But Bernie Cooper and his first mate, they were in close contact.

So, we do know that it would stand to reason that the crew members in the pilothouse were well aware of the situation that the Fitzgerald was in and that maybe if they were going to, you know, catch up to the Fitzgerald, which at that point was unlikely because there was still ten miles distance and they were getting very close to the Soo.

I would think that the crew members would want to do everything possible to make sure that the Fitzgerald would get safely to the Soo, or maybe to conduct a rescue without jeopardizing the lives of the rest of the crew members of the Anderson.

- What was finally then decided?

I mean, the Fitzgerald just disappears in the night in the storm without giving any clear indication of what their final moments were.

So, there's an investigation?

- So, the investigation is not conducted until the next spring.

So, the Coast Guard and the National Transportation Safety Board, they had their own reports, and there were some differences between it.

And so, immediately when those reports came out, and the reason why the reports didn't come out until six or seven months later is because eyes weren't put on the wreckage until, like, March or April of 1976.

So, they had a vehicle that went down there that had pictures and video of how it looked like.

And so, based on that, but mainly based on testimony from crew members on the Anderson, as well as people who are tending to the National Weather Service stations, as well as the Coast Guard, industry experts, they're the ones that constituted most of the report since there was limited visual evidence of what happened to the ship and how it did.

And, you know, keep in mind that this ship is about 700 feet long, and there is a significant distance between the bow and the stern, that it would take a long time for video to capture all of that.

And if you look at the technology in 1975, 1976, it's a lot different than what it was today.

So, you have these reports that come out, these dueling reports, and immediately each one, the National Transportation Safety Board and the Coast Guard report, they are arguing with one another, saying that "Your report is not valid, ours is."

And what's important about that, even though the reports were not giving a lot of answers and that there were a lot of questions, the message that came from that is that this is going to continue to be a political controversy.

You have these government agencies that can't seem to agree on this.

They're fighting back and forth.

Then you have the Lake Carriers' Association.

They have their own opinion.

In the middle of all this, you have the family members who six, seven months later, they don't have any answers.

And even though there is video of the ship, it's not enough evidence to make a determination conclusively what had happened to it.

And that also plays into the dynamics with the lawsuits and the legal action had that had been transpiring in the meantime.

- There is a, I'm going to call it a simulation, of what the Fitzgerald looks like down on the bottom.

And what were the conclusions for that?

- Well, I mean, again, that, it kind of raises more questions than answers.

And so, if you look at how the ship is positioned based on that information, based on previous studies, some will say that it's conclusive that it broke apart on the surface, just by the nature of how it landed on the lake bottom and the disbursement of the millions and millions of pellets.

Other people will say that it went into a nosedive because of the shift, the massive shift of the taconite ore from the middle and from the stern toward the bow.

So, that's really, I mean, based on my research, that wasn't as conclusive as I think some people made it out to be.

And when people ask me about, you know, why was it that it sank, I'm pretty consistent.

Which is the reason why it sank is it simply was not seaworthy.

All of these I like to look at proximate causes.

This is what happened in the 15th round.

My work and research and my book is based on the first 14 rounds.

Acknowledging that there are a number of scenarios that could have happened in the 15th round.

Was it, you know, a right hook, a left hook?

I don't know, but what I do know is that this ship had been beaten, battered, and bruised for the first 14 rounds, and it was only a matter of time before it sank.

– Norman: What was the legacy then?

What came out of it?

Mystery notwithstanding.

– Thomas: Well, fortunately, there hasn't been-- there hadn't been another sinking up until, I think, last year.

There was a ship that ran aground, and so it had to be towed into port.

And that's important because there were some changes that were made.

I don't think there was enough made.

But the good thing is that the weather equipment, the weather equipment did in fact improve over time.

Technology improved too.

And I think that that has a lot to do with the fact that there has not been another sinking.

But what that also tells me is that the Fitzgerald certainly was an exceptional case, that it was not taken care of properly, that it was allowed to fall apart and eventually sink.

Whether or not other companies learned that lesson, wisened up to that, and made sure that their ships were in better working order, it's pretty clear that the ones for which there was vertical integration, and you had companies that owned and operated these vessels, that was a given because they wanted to get as much life out of that as possible, and they were responsible for it.

Whether or not Oglebay Norton, that's not clear.

I know that, going back, that the Fitzgerald was not the only ship in its fleet that had problems.

So, there was another ship, the Sylvania, that two or three years before, before the Fitzgerald sank, the rudder fell off.

So, this was not exceptional in that regard, that this company, that there was, in fact, a track record that was not taking care of its equipment.

- Was there some compensation for the families ultimately?

- Okay, so this was-- This has been a part of the Fitzgerald legacy that hasn't been explored that much.

It constitutes a pretty big part of my book.

What happened is the company wanted to settle with the families as quick as possible.

There was $1 million deductible, and based on interviews with some family members, it seemed as though Oglebay Norton was going to spend $1 million because they had to do that, but they weren't gonna do a penny more.

$1 million divided by 29 is $35,000, and that is the figure that several family members have said as how much they have received.

And what happened is a lot of those families signed off.

They got their $35,000.

But then, there was talk about some families getting attorneys that were able to get more money.

And it's a really interesting story because at the heart of this story are two individuals from Wisconsin.

Dick Hunegs, who was from Ashland, as well as Toby Marcovich, who was an attorney, still practicing in Superior.

And they fulfilled very important roles, tracking down Red Burgner for the deposition, tracking down evidence that showed that it was not in sound working order.

But what happened is when word came out that some families had signed up for attorneys, the others could not because they had already signed off with the insurance company or with the-- or with Oglebay Norton.

And they wanted to, but they couldn't.

Legally, they couldn't.

So, the average settlement was about $35,000.

But there were some family members that received settlements in excess of $100,000, $200,000.

- Sounds complicated.

- Sounds very complicated.

- And not necessarily... all equal for everybody.

- It was not, it was.

And it was a source of contention among some of the families.

It took a long time too.

According to Toby Marcovich, for the family that he represented, he didn't get the settlement until about 1982.

– Norman: Wow.

- So, six or seven years.

- Well, Thomas M. Nelson, thank you for sharing your insights... - Of course.

- ...into the very famous, notorious and heroic Edmund Fitzgerald.

- Thank you.

- I'm Norman Gilliland, and I hope you can join me next time around for University Place Presents.

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