November 10, 1975. I don’t have a clue what I was
doing that day. I bet in looking back, not a lot of people remember, expect for
the families of 29 men who lost their lives that day. I bet that for most people,
the events of that day only became known through a song written a year later.
If you haven’t guessed, Sunday was the 38th
anniversary of the sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald. Now that I told you that,
you can recall everything else about that fateful night on Lake Superior. But I
discovered something new the other night, new for me anyway.
Do you know who the iron ore freighter was named
after? Ok, besides Mr. Edmund Fitzgerald.
The man Edmund Fitzgerald had been a business and
civic leader in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, for more than 50 years. He had been
president of Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Co., which had built the
720-foot ship. When it came time for the board of trustees to vote on naming
the freighter, someone made sure that Mr. Fitzgerald was out of the room. They
knew that he didn’t want the boat named after him, but afterwards he admitted
that it was one of his proudest moments. The sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald
was one of his worst moments.
He died in 1986 at the age of 90.
His son, Edmund B. Fitzgerald should be well-known
among baseball fans as he was instrumental in bringing the Brewers to
Milwaukee. I was quite disappointed that my husband didn’t know that, but he
recovered by telling me that the Brewers had originally been the Seattle
Pilots.
Edmund B. Fitzgerald passed away this August. I
totally missed that. How sad when someone dies and we don’t hear about it.
I could go on. I find all these little known facts
fascinating. I have another story about someone who just passed but I will wait
until Thursday. In the meantime, what does the B in Ed’s name stand for?
From a freighter on Lake Superior to the current home of the Milwaukee Brewers.
I get around, don't I?
3 comments:
Bacon was his middle name. I'm guessing it's a family surname. Or maybe his mother craved bacon during her pregnancy.
Good job, Elizabeth. His grandfather was Frank Bacon.
My Dave was going to school at Michigan Tech & remembers seeing ships coming into port in Hancock/Houghton for safety from the storm, the next week there was even a worse storm.
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