Local ships bring maritime history alive
By Sandra Serra Bradshaw
Sun contributor
The interest in traditional sailing ships—both here in the Grand Traverse region and throughout much of the world—fascinates many. This enthusiasm for both reconstructing and maintaining these boats visually connects maritime history with current times. Schooners would grace the waterways not only out of need in the early days of our area being settled, but again today, bringing a deep recreational satisfaction to many. Being aboard, skimming over the water, feeling the wooden planks underneath one’s feet, winds whipping the face, is sheer exhilaration for the adventurous.
To see these boats with their billowing sails on Grand Traverse Bay is spellbinding. They provide a modern-day vision of an era when schooners were the work boats of the Great Lakes, opening up the country before the great forests were cut and roads were made. By some luck, hard work and right circumstances, six of these extraordinary, well-loved boats make their home in Leelanau County waters; Madeline, Manitou, the Inland Seas, Perception, Utopia, and the littleGracie L.
A passion for classic wooden boats brought together the founders of the Maritime Heritage Alliance (MHA) in the early 1980s. Their primary interest was to preserve the maritime history of the area. A quote from the late Bill Livingston, a renowned boat builder from Northport, typifies the Alliance’s attitude: “The real joys in life consist of making something with our hands, not making money, but making something.” MHA has done just that in the ensuing years.
Rich Brauer, filmmaker and president of Brauer Productions in Traverse City, was among a small handful of persons in the then newly forming MHA interested in recreating historic wooden boats. He co-founded MHA in 1982, where he currently serves as president. Brauer also co-founded the Inland Seas Education Association (ISEA) of Suttons Bay in 1989 (more on that in an upcoming issue).
The first wooden boat constructed by MHA was in 1983 in the form of the 20-ft. Mackinaw boat, Gracie L, named after Brauer’s daughter. Mackinaw boats were light and open sailboats that were used on the Upper Great Lakes during the fur trading era. They were noted for their cargo capacity and speed, an upgrade of sorts of the Native American canoe, and more suited to the often rough waters of the Inland Seas. Mackinaw-type boats were used as early as 1804-1806 in the Lewis and Clark expedition.
Besides plying on the Great Lakes, fur traders put them to good use on the upper Missouri River and its principal tributaries, and to a lesser extent, elsewhere in the then growing new country. Today, the reconstructed Mackinaw boat Gracie L can often be seen at boat shows and festivals in the region. Shortly after the successful building of the Gracie L, persons within MHA decided to move forward with a more massive project.
The 56-ft. replica of the Madeline—made almost entirely by an all-volunteer force—came the next project for the industrious MHA. The original Madeline, built in 1845 at Fairport, Ohio, sailed the waters of the Great Lakes more than 165 years ago. In the winter of 1851-52, Madeline served as the first non-Native American school in the region for five aspiring young men. They, along with their captain and crew, realized they needed some book-learning in order to succeed in their careers. So, before the lakes were frozen, they sailed Madeline into the quiet and secluded Bowers Harbor, off the Old Mission Peninsula.
There they spent their time devoted to their education; time was well-spent as each went on to successful careers on the Great Lakes. One of the grandchildren of the clan headed an insurance company which named and owned another famous boat: the SS Edmund Fitzgerald, the American Great Lakes freighter that sank in Lake Superior during a storm on Nov. 10, 1975, sadly with the loss of the entire crew of 29 men.
Today’s Madeline, built of oak and pine, was designed by noted local shipbuilder Bob Core to duplicate the original Madeline. The Madeline carries the title of “Ambassador to Traverse City,” and serves as an official envoy for Grand Traverse County. It has also received state recognition as a historic vessel. “MHA was incredibly confident that we could raise the dollars needed to build the boat,” said Brauer. “We green-lighted the project which was pretty unique to MHA, without having any money from anywhere we moved ahead with our project.”
“When MHA board member and historian Steve Harold had discovered the Madeline was instrumental in being the first organized school north of Grand Rapids,” Brauer related, “…it became clear to all of us that that would be the boat we would reconstruct. Madeline represents education. So we moved forward with plans to build Madeline, and five years later she was finished,” explained Brauer. “Early on, Jerry Olsen (of Olsen Foods in Traverse City), thought from the get go we were doing an amazing thing in building the Madeline. He has supported us 100% in our efforts ever since then.”
“Ed Brown (MHA co-founder and first president) recruited a lot of people to help build Madeline. (Brown passed away at the age of 98 in 2012). We went from two to three workers a day to 10 to 15 a day;” reminisced Bob Core. “And visitors swelled from a curious few to over 300 stopping by in just one day,” he remarked. “We are really grateful to the Great Lakes Maritime Academy at Northwestern Michigan College for giving us their entire dock space on West Bay to do our projects. We could not have built the Madeline without their support.”
The Madeline was launched in July 1990 in Traverse City with several thousand onlookers on hand. Today, Madeline and her crew travel to ports of call throughout the Great Lakes each summer representing the region. While in home port,Madeline is available to residents—at no charge—for weekly community sails. During the off-season, Madeline is used as a platform for both basic and advanced crew training. MHA volunteers can learn how to sail a tall ship and venture forth as dedicated crew to destinations around the Great Lakes.
MHA took ownership of the historically relevant replica Welcome in 2006. The original Welcome was built in 1774 by fur-trader John Askin, whose trading outpost is now a popular attraction for tourists at Fort Michilimackinac on Mackinac Island. The original Welcome sailed the Great Lakes between 1774 to 1781. Originally intended to be a fur trading vessel, she was requisitioned as an armed sloops by the British military before being launched.
Its stature as a royal ship is echoed in the penned words of King George III in 1776: “I do hereby Certify, That the crew and owners of the sloop Welcome have, in my Preferance, voluntarily taken an Oath to bear Faith and true Allegiance to his Majesty . . . and to defend to the utmost of his power, His sacred person, Crown and Government, against all persons [….]” Welcome also had the distinction of taking over the first house from the mainland fort at Mackinaw to the new fort on Mackinaw Island during the Revolutionary War. During that time there were 12 seamen and 12 soldiers aboard, taking the sides of Britain.
Today, history buffs will find at the MHA library the fascinating 1779 log of Major Arent Schuyler DePeyster, commander at Michilimackinac. It accurately portrays sailing on the Great Lakes during that time period, and of the many voyages between the fort and the port at Detroit. With the Revolutionary War in full-speed ahead, Americans were putting British authority in serious jeopardy.
DePeyster feared an American attack on Detroit, and subsequently one on Fort Michilimackinac. In an effort to secure intelligence of the Americans’ plans, DePeyster purchased the sloop Welcome from his close friend John Askin. He sent the sloop up Lake Huron and dispatched twenty soldiers and 200 Indians to rally the Indians at Fort St Joseph (Niles, Mich.). A major council was held on July 4 in the Ottawa settlement L’Arbre Croche (Cross Village, Mich.). Two days later, DePeyster welcomed the prestigious Sioux chief Wahpasha (or his son) to Michilimackinac. Due to the truce of 1775, he was able to secure the temporary cooperation of the Sioux and Ojibwas in defending Michilimackinac. The original Welcome was lost at sea during a violent storm in 1781 on Lake Huron; the exact spot where she sank is unknown.
The reconstructed Welcome enjoyed a colorful career as a participant in historical reenactments of famous naval battles that took place on the Great Lakes. MHA gifted the sloop to Emmet County in 2015 for $1.00. The county sold it to businessman Joe Lieghio of Mackinaw City for $10,111, reported the Petoskey News-Review.
Never to sit still on past laurels, in 2006 MHA began restoration on the H-28 Arcturos, designed by noted yacht builder L. Francis Herreshoff (1890 to 1972), and built in 1947 by Joel Johnson. This carvel-planked cedar over oak framed vessel is a beautiful boat to sail and a wonderful addition to MHA’s fleet. Arcturos was donated to MHA by Suttons Bay residents Don Coe and Jim Wall. Then there is the cutter Champion, a 39′ classic wooden sailboat. She was built in 1968 and donated to MHA in 2008 by Henry Barkhausen of Harbor Springs. The cutter is available for charter sails on West Grand Traverse Bay (check MHA for rates—when it is not in use for one of its educational youth programs, this is the boat’s primary focus). All of these boats are indeed an enrichment to our knowledge of both past and current local maritime history.
For further information please contact the MHA office at (231) 946-2647 or visit MaritimeHeritageAlliance.org.
