The Sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald Quiz

Answer: The Great Lakes

The Edmund Fitzgerald was a cargo ship on the Great Lakes in North America. These ships were called "lakers". At the time she was built, the Edmund Fitzgerald was the largest of her kind, measuring 729 feet in length.

Answer: Gordon Lightfoot

Gordon Lightfoot is a Canadian folk singer, born Nov 17, 1938. He is thought to have been inspired to write about the wreck after reading an article in Newsweek. "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" became one of Lightfoot's most successful recordings.

Answer: Soo Locks Swimmer

She was that largest "laker" at the time and was called the "Queen of the Great Lakes", "The Toledo Express" and (somewhat regrettably in retrospect), "The Titanic of the Great Lakes". The Soo Locks connect Lake Superior to Lake Huron via the St Mary's River.

Although the Edmund Fitzgerald used these locks many times in her 17 year career, even sustaining damage near the locks in 1969 and again in the lock in 1974, I find no reference to her being called the "Soo Locks Swimmer".

Answer: Her bell

Due to the fact that many divers were visiting the wreck which is the final resting place of the 29 men who died when she sank, the crew's family members had requested that just one item be taken from the wreckage and put on display as a memorial. In July 1995, the Edmund Fitzgerald's 200 lb. bronze bell was recovered by the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society and other groups.

The bell is now on display in the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum as a memorial to her lost crew.

Answer: Cold temperature

According to the Gordon Lightfoot ballad "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald": "The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
When the skies of November turn gloomy".

One reason for this is the cold temperature of the lake below 660 feet (110 fathoms)deep. It is almost constant, at 39 degrees F. This is too cold for bacteria to work and form oxygen that would attach to and carry biological remains to the surface.

Answer: 29

She was captained by Ernest McSorely. This was to be his final voyage before he was due to retire. During the search and rescue efforts November 10 and 11, and the later recovery endeavors, no survivors were found nor bodies recovered.

Answer: November 10, 1975

2:20 AM April 15, 1912 sinking of the RMS Titanic of the White Star Line after colliding with an iceberg.
10:09 AM July 26, 1959 sinking of the Andrea Doria, a after a colliding with the MS Stockholm of the Swedish American Line
2:12 - 2:32 PM May 7, 1915 sinking of the RMS Lusitania after being hit with a German u-boat torpedo.
7:30 - 7:30 PM November 10, 1975 the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald

Answer: Whitefish Bay

Whitefish Bay has a lighthouse that was built in 1849. Unfortunately, the lights and navigational beacon failed in the storm when Edmund Fitzgerald was trying to make her way there. Since neither of her 2 on-board radar systems were working due to storm damage, she was "travelling blind" when she sunk in 535 feet of cold, cold water.

Answer: 17 years: 1958 - 1975

She was christened in 1958 and had her maiden voyage that year. She went down in 1975.

Answer: Iron ore

She was carrying 26,116 tons of taconite pellets, an iron ore used in the manufacture of steel.