WHITEFISH POINT, Mich. – The wreck of the Western Reserve has been discovered in Lake Superior after 132 years.
The Western Reserve, a 300-foot steel steamer, was discovered about 60 miles northwest of Whitefish Point in Lake Superior by the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society using Marine Sonic Technology side-scan sonar on the non-profit’s research vessel, David Boyd, in the summer of 2024.
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The ship was found broken in two, with the bow section resting on top of the stern and about 600 feet of water.
Western Reserve history
According to the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society, the Western Reserve was one of the first all-steel vessels on the Great Lakes, and it was built to break cargo shipping records and was deemed one of the safest ships afloat.
The ship was owned by millionaire Captain Peter G. Minch. He took his young family aboard his ship for a late-summer cruise up through Lake Huron en route to Two Harbors in Minnesota. The nonprofit said the weather was pleasant until they reached Whitefish Bay, where rough water led the crew to drop anchor and wait for better conditions.
Once they weighed anchor and steamed into Lake Superior, strong winds overtook the ship at around 9 p.m. on Aug. 30, 1892. The Western Reserve started to break up and sink.
The Minch family and crew members left the Western Reserve in two lifeboats.
Almost immediately, the historical society said one lifeboat overturned, and many of the ship’s crew disappeared. Those in the remaining lifeboat only recovered two of the crew members.
The Minch family and the remaining crew members were on the last lifeboat.
Within 10 minutes, the ship was gone. Those in the last lifeboat were left in high winds and darkness for the next 10 hours. Salvation was near at hand when a steamship passed them in the night. They screamed for a half-hour, but with no flares, they were not seen.
At around 7:30 a.m. the following morning, they were within one mile of the shoreline west of Deer Park Life-Saving Station when the lifeboat overturned in the breakers.
Only one survived—Wheelsman Harry W. Stewart from Algonac.
“Every shipwreck has its own story, but some are just that much more tragic,” said Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society Executive Director Bruce Lynn. “It is hard to imagine that Captain Peter G. Minch would have foreseen any trouble when he invited his wife, two young children, and sister-in-law with her daughter aboard the Western Reserve for a summer cruise up the lakes. It just reinforces how dangerous the Great Lakes can be…any time of year.”
For two years, Director of Marine Operations Darryl Ertel and his brother and First Mate, Dane Ertel, were looking for the Western Reserve.
“We side-scan looking out a half mile per side and we caught an image on our port side. It was very small looking out that far, but I measured the shadow, and it came up about 40 feet,” Darryl said, “So we went back over the top of the ship and saw that it had cargo hatches, and it looked like it was broken in two, one half on top of the other and each half measured .with the side scan 150 feet long and then we measured the width and it was right on so we knew that we’d found the Western Reserve.”
