Shipwrecked sailing vessels of Wisconsin's Lake Michigan

Abstract

There are literally thousands of shipwrecks in the Great Lakes. Near the eastern coast of Wisconsin, hundreds of these wrecks lay on the bottom of Lake Michigan. This paper examines the shipwrecked sailing vessels of Wisconsin's Lake Michigan in order to answer three main questions. First, what were the most common causes for ships in this region to go down? Second, are any parts of the lake more dangerous than other? Finally, how do these ships appear in the archaeological record? The first question has been answered through an in-depth analysis of the Wisconsin State Historical Society's shipwreck database. The second question is addressed by looking at these wrecks spatially in comparison to ports and to one another. The last question is answered through a detailed study of three previously excavated/explored wrecks and two unexcavated shipwrecks. Predictions about the two unexcavated wrecks are then made based on their correlations and similarities with the previously excavated wrecks. One of the most important conclusions discovered in this research is how a ship's cargo can break a vessel apart as it sinks, thus causing a large debris field on the lake bottom.