Were it not for iconic Canadian folk singer and songwriter Gordon Lightfoot, few people, boaters or otherwise, would understand the true impact of the sinking of the SS Edmund Fitzgerald.
With the news of Lightfoot’s unfortunate passing at the age of 84, the moment provides an opportunity for boaters to reflect on his contributions to maritime history.
For those unaware, the SS Edmund Fitzgerald was an American freighter who encountered a massive storm on Lake Superior on November 10th, 1975. She went down near Whitefish Bay in some of the worst conditions ever recorded, taking all 29 crew with her.
She was an enormous ship — 730 feet long with a 75-foot beam and a 25-foot draught. She was designed to carry precious ore from mining developments around the Great Lakes and deliver them to her American owners in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Her captain, Ernest M. McSorley, was Canadian by birth and had commanded nine other ships before taking the helm of the Fitzgerald in 1972.
The ship’s loss was intimately captured by Newsweek in an article titled The Cruelest Month and has continually served as the most recognized retelling of the events.
Launched in 1958, she was the largest ship on the Great Lakes, and to this day remains the largest ship to have ever sunk in any of the Great Lakes’ five massive basins.
Her unfortunate legacy stands as the worst shipwreck in North American freshwater history.
But few would know about the true impact of the Edmund Fitzgerald were it not for the iconic Canadian songsmith
Aside from marine historians or those with a connection to the Great Lakes, the loss of the Fitzgerald, although a staggering tragedy to those who followed the news, would have otherwise sunk into the depths of the collective consciousness over time. As with all major events, news writers eventually latch onto the next headline, leaving those affected behind to navigate the depths of their tragedy alone.
While it was a gradual development, the broader cultural impact of Lightfoot’s music, and specifically the influence of “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” has only gained strength with time. It has been 48 years since the ship went down, but today more than ever, her memory is recognized as an intrinsic piece of Canadian culture. Ask any sailor, or any Canadian citizen for that matter, if they’ve spent a night in a harbourfront speakeasy, and they’ll tell you that “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald” played through the jukebox at some point. If it didn’t, it was done acapella by patrons late into the evening.
The song was released in August 1976 as an unvarnished retelling. Lightfoot’s style mixed deeply autobiographical storytelling with elongated verses and acoustic atmospheres, and the lyrics to ‘The Wreck’ are a poetic, albeit de-facto, recital of that cold November night.
In a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed
In the maritime sailors’ cathedral
The church bell chimed ’til it rang twenty-nine times
For each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald
The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee
Superior, they said, never gives up her dead
When the gales of November come early
One of the songs hnique details is that the lyrics were written before the ship had been found. In the five days between the ship’s loss and eventual discovery on November 15th, 1975, Lightfoot somehow captured the essence of Canadian mourning before the silt had even settled.
“I simply write the songs about where I am and where I’m from,” he once proclaimed. “I take situations and write poems about them.”
Lightfoot was born in Orillia, Ontario, on the shores of Lake Simcoe, in 1938. His connection to the water was both literal and figurative. As his career flourished with records like Sit Down Young Stranger (1970), Sundown (1974), Summertime Dream (1976), and Endless Wire (1978), he never strayed far from the water, spending his later years living in Toronto, one of Canada’s most influential maritime cities.
He was a boater, too. In an article with Yachting Magazine in 1979, Lightfoot expressed a profound love for his sailboat, aptly named Sundown, saying: “She’s absolutely beautiful. Whattaya say to a big cruiser that’ll still come through in the Macks?” referring to the annual Mackinac Yacht Race on Lake Huron.
Lightfoot would later have a cruising sloop named Golden Goose custom built by Superior Sailboats in Port McNicoll, Ontario on Georgian Bay. His affinity for boating and the Great Lakes is evident when listening to the lyrics of songs like “Christian Island,” a 1972 single devoted to one of Georgian Bay’s most well-known sanctuaries.
With the loss of one of Canada’s most beloved musicians, today is once again a solemn reminder to remember the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald and the timeless music of Gordon Lightfoot.
Take a moment to enjoy “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.” The full lyrics are below:
The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee
The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
When the skies of November turn gloomy
With a load of iron ore twenty-six thousand tons more
Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty
That good ship and true was a bone to be chewed
When the gales of November came early
The ship was the pride of the American side
Coming back from some mill in Wisconsin
As the big freighters go, it was bigger than most
With a crew and good captain well seasoned
Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms
When they left fully loaded for Cleveland
And later that night when the ship’s bell rang
Could it be the north wind they’d been feelin’?
The wind in the wires made a tattle-tale sound
And a wave broke over the railing
And every man knew, as the captain did too
T’was the witch of November come stealin’
The dawn came late and the breakfast had to wait
When the gales of November came slashin’
When afternoon came it was freezin’ rain
In the face of a hurricane west wind
When suppertime came, the old cook came on deck sayin’
“Fellas, it’s too rough to feed ya”
At seven PM, a main hatchway caved in, he said
“Fellas, it’s been good to know ya”
The captain wired in he had water comin’ in
And the good ship and crew was in peril
And later that night when his lights went outta sight
Came the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald
Does any one know where the love of God goes
When the waves turn the minutes to hours?
The searchers all say they’d have made Whitefish Bay
If they’d put fifteen more miles behind her
They might have split up or they might have capsized
They may have broke deep and took water
And all that remains is the faces and the names
Of the wives and the sons and the daughters
Lake Huron rolls, Superior sings
In the rooms of her ice-water mansion
Old Michigan steams like a young man’s dreams
The islands and bays are for sportsmen
And farther below Lake Ontario
Takes in what Lake Erie can send her
And the iron boats go as the mariners all know
With the gales of November remembered
In a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed
In the maritime sailors’ cathedral
The church bell chimed ’til it rang twenty-nine times
For each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald
The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they called Gitche Gumee
Superior, they said, never gives up her dead
When the gales of November come early
