The SS Edmund Fitzgerald was owned by the Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company and was registerd in the Port of Milwaukee. She first launched in 1958, built by Great Lakes Engineering Works.
She was a lake freighter 729 feet in length, 75 feet wide, and carried taconite ore pellets from mines near Duluth, Minnesota to ports in Detroit, Toledo and others. She was the largest ship to haul iron ore on the Great Lakes.
On her final voyage the Edmund Fitzgerald left Superior, Wisconsin (Nov 9, 1975) with a full load (25,400 tons). With a seasoned crew and Captain (Ernest M. McSorley) on board, they were joined by a second freighter, SS Arthur M. Anderson. The weather turned bad the next day.
The Arthur M. Anderson received two messages from the Edmund Fitzgerald. The first “I have a bad list, lost both radars. And am taking heavy seas over the deck. One of the worst seas I’ve ever been in.” and the second, and last, was “We are holding our own.”
Only two empty lifeboats were found and no crew. A U.S. Navy Lockheed P-3 Orion aircraft found the sunken ship 4 days later. The Edmund Fitzgerald was broken in half and some have recently speculated that the front was on a giant wave and the rear on another tearing the hull in half.