Editor’s Note: As the Edmund Fitzgerald was hurtling towards its fate on November 10, 1975, a crew of commercial fishermen aboard the Jean Maur B here in the Apostle Islands had their own battle with the famous storm, and miles to go before they could hope for safety. Here, in his own words, is the story from crewman and historian Bob Nelson.

On November 10, 1975, the mighty SS EDMUND FITZGERALD descended and imploded into the bottom of Lake Superior, near Whitefish Point, Michigan. All 29 seamen perished on that fateful day. My real-life commercial fishing experience on Lake Superior that day was envisioned from the wheel house of the commercial fish tug JEAN MAUR B and the stern deck gangway. The scenario and tragedy remains vivid to this day.

I was then a 25 year old deckhand/commercial fisherman on Lake Superior aboard this fish tug when the “FITZ”, plunged and sank to about 530 feet of water in Canadian waters. The charted area was just barely to the North of the American waters tight to the international border line, approximately 17 miles West of Whitefish Point, Michigan.

The all steel fish tug I worked on was named the JEAN MAUR B, presently renamed the ELEANOR B, weighed in at 44 tons, is 12 feet abeam, 50 feet long and then equipped with a 75-90 Kahlenberg diesel engine.

A typical work day commercially fishing in November consisted of lifting and setting 2 ½ to 3 inch stretch mesh nylon gill nets for Menomonie/round whitefish and Lake Herring (Ciscoes) in and around the pristine waters of the Apostle Islands. Days started at 5 AM and ended when the fish were relocated in the fish house. So it was on this cold and clear day November 10th, at about 2:30 o’clock in the afternoon and flat calm when we departed the rock reef on the south end of Devils Island and arrived ½ mile west of Outer Island Lighthouse about 4 PM to set a gang of Herring (Cisco) nets on the boulder filled reef.

The radio weather forecast for the day broadcast gale force winds from the NE that were set to arrive later on. Calm as it was, we started to set the nets. no wind. dead calm – no fear! Approaching the setting site, the JEAN MAUR B slowed to barely moving to the northeast direction. The depth finder indicated 10 fathom of water (60 feet), so we dropped the two-flagged inside end buoy and set 6 boxes/6000 feet of herring nets on the bottom. The crew consisted of owner Morris Boutin, partner Dean Halvorson and I. Finished setting the nets I dropped the outside net anchor and flipped the single-flag buoy out the stern gangway in about 14 fathom (84) feet. Having completed our work, contemplating somewhat of a rough ride home to Bayfield at about 5’ o’clock P.M., and after me on the roof securing the extra net buoys we carried, we departed for Bayfield. Little did we expect to lose all that gear that day.

With the wind gently at first picking up a trifle from the Northeast, I climbed up the exterior ladder to the roof to secure about 12 more buoys to the hand rails. While there, I remarked to myself that the normal short huffs and puffs of smoke-like exhaust exhaled from the engine stack, generally appearing in donut like rings one after another, were now flattening out by the winds that started to pick up. About sunset, and two miles away, and by the time we rounded the close-by Hans Austad Bay on the Northeast side of Outer Island the exhaust rings were whirling and blowing side-ways. Thence-forth the Northeast blowing storm gathered a fierce head of steam. Six foot white capped seas were starting to build. Time to head to the safety of the interior, I grabbed the roof’s hand rail, hopped off to the gunnel rail and slid into the port-side bow gangway. Dean met me as I slid in and said, “Nelson we’ll never see these nets again”. (And so it came to be).

By 6:00 on our 2.5 hour journey back to the port of Bayfield that dark and squally evening JEAN MAUR B was in the open water of Lake Superior. Gangways closed and battened down/pinned shut, we steamed toward Anderson’s Point on Stockton Island, about half-way distant to Bayfield. Down-bound between Madeline, Wilson and Bass Island the giant roller-coaster like ride commenced full in a full furry fashion. Tossed around like a beach ball by the rolling seas on a fair wind ride, the waves on our stern on this journey had expanded from flat calm to near 15 feet high in the next hour; whitecaps swirled on top of whitecaps.

We did arrive safely and secured JEAN MAUR B securely to her concrete filled tie posts and tire ring. It was then and there we heard from fellow commercial fishermen also on the lake that day that the mighty FITZ met her fate. I faced the east, bowed my head, made the sign of the cross for the captain and crew and decided I would one day write this epilogue at some time, now 50 years later.

Note: The SS EDMUND FITZGERALD was an American Great Lakes freighter. The steamer was owned by Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company. The operating company was Columbia Transportation Division, Oglebay Norton Company of Cleveland, Ohio. The Fitzgerald’s home port was Milwaukee, WI. Carrying a load of 26, 535 tons of taconite ore pellets, the “Fitz” was headed to Sault St. Marie, near 200 miles from the Outer Island Lighthouse of the world famous Apostle Islands group. Under the command of Captain Ernest M. McSorley, the “FITZ” sank in a fierce Lake Superior storm off Whitefish Point on the eastern shore of Lake Superior. The captain and the entire crew of 29 seamen perished. My notes further explained that when launched on June 7, 1958, the “FITZ” was the largest ship on North America’s Great Lakes, and she remains the largest to have sunk there. The FITZGERALD overall length was 729 feet by 29 feet abeam/wide. She traveled along at 16 miles per hour and held a cargo hold capacity of 25,400 tons.

Featured image: Edmund Fitzgerald painting from Bayfield Maritime Museum