That was a hard stretch to put in the News Wire, but they made it fit.
There is a railroad photo containing the Edmund Fitzgerald in the book Grand Trunk Western: In Color Volume 2: Visual Redesign published by Morning Sun Books. The photo is located at the back of the book in the Detroit area photos.
The Gordon Lightfoot song about the Edmund Fitzgerald is not very well structured once a person knows a fair amount details about the captain and the ship. He wanders off topic in the song and starts talking about the Great Lakes. Gordon, the song was supposed to be about the history of the ship and the crew. If you wanted to do a song about the Great Lakes, write another song. Gordon Lightfoot might have written the first song about the Edmund Fitzgerald, but is is not the best song.
Andrew
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Here are the lyrics for The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald.
Gordon wanders around so much off topic, he missed a mention of the railroad loading docks.
I will have to read books like "The night the Fitz went Down" and write my own song, which will mention railroads and loading docks in the opening.
The legend lives on from the (Em) Chippewa on down Of the (G) big lake they (D) call Gitche (Asus2) Gumee The lake, it is said, never (Em) gives up her dead When the (G) skies of No(D)vember turn (Asus2) gloomy With a load of iron ore twenty-six (Em) thousand tons more Than the (G) Edmund Fitz(D)gerald weighed (Asus2) empty That good ship and true was a (Em) bone to be chewed When the (G) gales of No(D)vember came (Asus2) 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 feeling
(A) (A11) (Dsus4) (D) (Asus2)
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 Twas the witch of November come stealing The dawn came late and the breakfast had to wait When the Gales of November came slashing When afternoon came it was freezing rain In the face of a hurricane west wind
(A) (A11) (Dsus4) (D) (Asus2) (A11) (D) (Asus2)
When suppertime came, the old cook came on deck saying 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 coming in And the good ship and crew was in peril And later that night when his lights went out of 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 call Gitche Gumee Superior, they said, never gives up her dead When the gales of November come early
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
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The rundown of the Great Lakes seems to have been in an odd place in the song. That point in the song could hae been used to sing about how the familes of crew members had their lives distrupted. This is supposed to be a tough, emotional true like story, not a documentary on the Great Lakes.
The Ore Freighters start out at railroad ore loading docks, not at "some mill" like mentioned in the song. So he most likely got the information in a quickly written newswire story. The Trains Magazine newswire said it started out at a Burlington Northern ore dock. Freighters are loaded at ore docks not the mills.
It is powerful by the solem way he sings it. He has the rich, deep voice to carry the song.
The bells are tolled 29 times for the crew in Detroit. That would have been a fitting tribute for an audio recording.
He must have written and recorded this very quickly, without a chance to go back and check some facts and audio.
The only reason I remember the Gordon Lightfoot song is that at the time the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald was a great mystery to the general public. I heard it all the time in the 1970's, because the song involved Michigan. The reasons behind the sinking wers not a mystery to the crews of other freighters and the insurance companies. Eventually the Edmund Fitzgerald was located and photographed on the bottom of Lake Superior.
If you missed it in the newswire here is the article from 6 days ago:
SUPERIOR, Wis. - Today marks the 31st Anniversary of the sinking of the Great Lakes bulk freighter Edmund Fitzgerald in a Lake Superior gale in 1975. All 29 crewmen aboard the boat perished. The Fitzgerald's "rail" connection is the fact that its last cargo was a load of 26,116 tons of taconite pellets loaded at Burlington Northern's dock number 1 in Allouez (Superior), Wis. on Nov. 9. The pellets were consigned to Detroit. Traveling down Lake Superior in company with another bulk carrier, the Arthur M. Anderson of United States Steel's Great Lakes Fleet, the Fitzgerald encountered heavy weather and, in the early evening of Nov. 10, sank approximately 17 miles from the entrance to Whitefish Bay. The taconite pellets remain on the bottom with the ship. The Arthur M. Anderson remains in service today and is a frequent visitor to railroad ore docks on Lake Superior.
Like I said earlier. The Ore Freighters load at Railroad Ore Docks. The ore jennies are loaded at the mill. Gordon Lightfoot ended up cutting out that part of the journey for the heavy taconite pellets.
Andrew Falconer wrote: The Ore Freighters start out at railroad ore loading docks, not at "some mill" like mentioned in the song.
The Ore Freighters start out at railroad ore loading docks, not at "some mill" like mentioned in the song.
I've always taken that to be in reference to the previous trip. Was the previous trip to a mill in Wisconsin ?
He must have written and recorded this very quickly, without a chance to go back and check some facts and audio. Andrew
If the previous trip was to a mill in Wisconsin, you owe an apology.
nanaimo73 wrote: Andrew Falconer wrote: The Ore Freighters start out at railroad ore loading docks, not at "some mill" like mentioned in the song. I've always taken that to be in reference to the previous trip. Was the previous trip to a mill in Wisconsin ? He must have written and recorded this very quickly, without a chance to go back and check some facts and audio. Andrew If the previous trip was to a mill in Wisconsin, you owe an apology.
If the newswire was wrong, I am sorry that the information from the newswire was wrong. I apoligize for getting any innacurate information from any news service.
ndbprr wrote:I used to live on Grosse Ile which is an island in the Detroit RIver south of Detroit. A friend had a canoe and he would go out along the edge of the river with it. The Detroit river has an 8 mph current in the Livingston channel there. One day he say's, " Let's go around the buoy so we can say we took the canoe to Canada". There wasn't a lot of lollygagging pulling against that current. When we were about fifty feet from the buoy he said, "Let's hold up awhile". I said, " We're going for it now or never". He said, "Look over your right shoulder". The Edmund Fitzgerald was about 100 yards away coming against the 8 mph current with a ten foot bow wave. We never did make it to Canada ever! We also weren't anywhere near it when it went by. It was a shock when it went down for me.
Remember to take a look in a copy of The Grand Trunk Western In Color Volume 2: Visual Redesign. There is a photo of this type of trip by the Edmund Fitzgerald.
Look up the book The Might Fitz on Amazon. There is an excerpt which clearly states that two of the last loads of taconite taken by the Fitz were at the Superior, Wisconsin Burlington Northern Loading Dock. There is no mention of the freighter being directly at "Some Mill" in Wisconsin. Gordon Lightfoot needs to rewrite his song. This actually happened.
The Burlington Northern Ore Jennies might have not been cleared for interchange service if the freighters could not make the trip.
Andrew Falconer wrote: Look up the book The Might Fitz on Amazon. There is an excerpt which clearly states that two of the last loads of taconite taken by the Fitz were at the Superior, Wisconsin Burlington Northern Loading Dock. There is no mention of the freighter being directly at "Some Mill" in Wisconsin. Gordon Lightfoot needs to rewrite his song. This actually happened. The Burlington Northern Ore Jennies might have not been cleared for interchange service if the freighters could not make the trip. Andrew
There is such a thing as poetic license, and I'm positive that Gordon Lightfoot made sure that his was valid before he wrote the song.
Gordon took a lot of artistic licence in this song.
Is it entertainment or a historical tribute?
Closer to entertainment for the masses.
I hate to be the bearer of harsh reality, but the songs "The Wreck of Old 97" and "Casey Jones" and "John Henry" and "The City of New Orleans" don't get all their facts right either. Moral: for history go to history books, not songs.
By the way get a roomful of experienced old Great Lakes sailors talking and you will hear different theories about the Edmund Fitzgerald. Some of them disagree sharply with the various official theories about loose hatches and such. There were serious errors in the only available charts evidently. But all agree that November on Superior can be brutal. Sailors, like railroaders, tend to have great memories and tell great stories.
Lightfoot's line about Lake Superior never giving up her dead (the water is so cold bodies do not decompose, form gas and rise to the surface) reminds me that many videos of the wreckage had to be edited because bodies were visable -- and individually recognizable, and out of respect for the families, they are not shown.
The Edmund Fitzgerald did visit Milwaukee once -- during a steel strike in the late 1950s when the ore business was shut down for a while -- and Milwaukee is the home of The Northwestern Mutual Life Inurance Company which owned it and named it after its Chairman and President, whose father also had a Great Lakes boat named after him. Mr Fitzgerald took the sinking of "his" boat very hard and went to the memorial services for the lost sailors.
Dave Nelson