Death & Lighthouses on the Great Lakes: A History of Murder and Misfortune

Death & Lighthouses on the Great Lakes: A History of Murder and Misfortune

Author: Dianna Higgs Stampfler

Publisher: Arcadia Publishing

Published: 2022-02

Total Pages: 176

ISBN-13: 1467149950

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The author of Michigan's Haunted Lighthouses shares tales of disaster and misfortune on the Great Lakes. Losing one's life while tending to a Great Lakes lighthouse sadly wasn't such an unusual occurrence. Death by murder, suicide or other tragic causes--while rare--were not unheard of. Two keepers on Lake Superior's Grand Island disappeared one early summer day in 1908, their decomposed remains found weeks later. A newly hired and some say depressed keeper on Pilot Island in Wisconsin's Door County slit his own throat after a consultation with a local butcher about the location of the jugular vein. A smallpox outbreak in the late 1890s led to the tragic death of a lighthouse hired hand on South Bass Island in Lake Erie. Join author Dianna Stampfler as she uncovers the facts (and debunks some fiction) behind some of the Great Lakes' darkest lighthouse tales.


Michigan's Haunted Lighthouses

Michigan's Haunted Lighthouses

Author: Dianna Stampfler

Publisher: Arcadia Publishing

Published: 2019-08-26

Total Pages: 140

ISBN-13: 143966630X

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Travel Michigan’s coast—and into the state’s history—with otherworldly tales of the spirits of those who sought to keep its waters safe. Michigan has more lighthouses than any other state, with more than 120 dotting its expansive Great Lakes shoreline. Many of these lighthouses lay claim to haunted happenings. Former keepers like the cigar-smoking Captain Townshend at Seul Choix Point and prankster John Herman at Waugoshance Shoal near Mackinaw City maintain their watch long after death ended their duties. At White River Light Station in Whitehall, Sarah Robinson still keeps a clean and tidy house, and a mysterious young girl at the Marquette Harbor Lighthouse seeks out other children and female companions. Countless spirits remain between Whitefish Point and Point Iroquois in an area well known for its many tragic shipwrecks. Join author and Promote Michigan founder Dianna Stampfler as she recounts the tales from Michigan’s ghostly beacons. “Haunting tales of Michigan’s lighthouses . . . Her stories come from lighthouse museums, friends and family.”—Great Lakes Echo


Great Lakes Lighthouses Encyclopedia

Great Lakes Lighthouses Encyclopedia

Author: Larry Wright

Publisher: Erin, Ont. : Boston Mills Press

Published: 2006

Total Pages: 456

ISBN-13:

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A comprehensive, illustrated encyclopedic guide to more than 650 Great Lakes lighthouses; US and Canada, current and historic. For each there is a description that includes history and construction details, and if open to the public how to access it.


Sport

Sport

Author: Pamela Cameron

Publisher: Wisconsin Historical Society Press

Published: 2019-04-08

Total Pages: 35

ISBN-13: 0870209140

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In 1914 crew members of the lighthouse tender Hyacinth rescued a stray puppy from the Milwaukee River and named him Sport. For the next twelve years, this charming Newfoundland-retriever mix lived the life of a ship dog, helping the Hyacinth crew as they carried supplies to lighthouses and maintained the buoys and other safety features around Lake Michigan. Sport quickly became a valued companion to his crew and a recognizable mascot of the lake—making friends in every port. In this beautifully illustrated children’s book based on historical documents and photographs, readers share in Sport’s adventures while discovering the various ways lighthouse tender ships helped keep the lake safe for others. Helpful diagrams, a map, and a historical note supplement this engaging story for young readers. 2020 Wisconsin Library Association Outstanding Children’s Book of the Year 2020 Midwest Book Award Gold Medal 2020 Library of Michigan Notable Book Award 2019 Historical Society of Michigan State History Award 2019 Moonbeam Children’s Book Award


Great Ships on the Great Lakes

Great Ships on the Great Lakes

Author: Cathy Green

Publisher: Wisconsin Historical Society

Published: 2013-09-23

Total Pages: 145

ISBN-13: 0870205927

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In this highly accessible history of ships and shipping on the Great Lakes, upper elementary readers are taken on a rip-roaring journey through the waterways of the upper Midwest. Great Ships on the Great Lakes explores the history of the region’s rivers, lakes, and inland seas—and the people and ships who navigated them. Read along as the first peoples paddle tributaries in birch bark canoes. Follow as European voyageurs pilot rivers and lakes to get beaver pelts back to the eastern market. Watch as settlers build towns and eventually cities on the shores of the Great Lakes. Listen to the stories of sailors, lighthouse keepers, and shipping agents whose livelihoods depended on the dangerous waters of Lake Michigan, Superior, Huron, Erie, and Ontario. Give an ear to their stories of unexpected tragedy and miraculous rescue, and heed their tales of risk and reward on the low seas. Great Ships also tells the story of sea battles and gunships, of the first vessels to travel beyond the Niagara, and of the treacherous storms and cold weather that caused thousands of ships to sink in the Great Lakes. Watch as underwater archaeologists solve the mysteries of Great Lakes shipwrecks today. And learn how the shift from sail to steam forever changed the history of shipping, as schooners made way for steamships and bulk freighters, and sailing became a recreation, not a hazardous way of life. Designed for the upper elementary classroom with emphasis on Michigan and Wisconsin, Great Ships on the Great Lakes includes a timeline of events, on-page vocabulary, and a list of resources and places to visit. Over 20 maps highlight the region’s maritime history. The accompanying Teacher’s Guide includes 18 classroom activities, arranged by chapter, including lessons on exploring shipwrecks and learning how glaciers moved across the landscape.


Legendary Lighthouses

Legendary Lighthouses

Author: John Grant

Publisher:

Published: 2001-09

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780762709533

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This lavishly illustrated volume celebrates America's treasured coastal beacons and explores the people, places and coasts they radiate from. Photos.


Women who Kept the Lights

Women who Kept the Lights

Author: Mary Louise Clifford

Publisher:

Published: 2000

Total Pages: 260

ISBN-13:

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Hundreds of American women have kept the lamps burning in lighthouses since Hannah Thomas tended Gurnet Point Light in Plymouth, Massachusetts, while her husband was away fighting in the War for Independence. Women Who Kept the Lights details the careers of 32 intrepid women who were official keepers of light stations on the Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific Coasts, on Lake Champlain and the Great Lakes, staying at their posts for periods ranging from a few years to half a century. Most of these women served in the nineteenth century, when the keeper lit a number of lamps in the tower at dusk, replenished their fuel or replaced them at midnight, and every morning polished the lamps and lanterns to keep their lights shining brightly. Several of these stalwart women were commended for their courage in remaining at their posts through severe storms and hurricanes. A few went to the rescue of seamen when ships capsized or were wrecked. Their varied stories paint a multifaceted picture of a unique profession in our maritime history.


The Lightkeeper's Daughters

The Lightkeeper's Daughters

Author: Jean E. Pendziwol

Publisher: HarperCollins

Published: 2017-07-04

Total Pages: 214

ISBN-13: 1443452238

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A Toronto Star bestseller * A Globe and Mail bestseller * A New York Post "must-read" book The Light Between Oceans meets The Language of Flowers in this beautiful debut novel by an acclaimed Canadian children’s author. Elizabeth's eyes have failed. She can no longer read the books she loves or see the paintings that move her spirit, but her mind remains sharp and music fills the vacancy left by her blindness as she ruminates on the secrets in her family's past. When her late father's journals are discovered on a shipwrecked boat, she enlists the help of a delinquent teenager, Morgan, who is completing community service at the senior home where Elizabeth lives. An unlikely relationship develops between the two as they work to decipher the books and are drawn into the musty words he penned more than seventy years before as he manned the lighthouse on Porphyry Island. In the process they come to realize that they are both connected to the isolated island, their lives touched by Elizabeth's enigmatic twin sister Emily and the beautiful but harsh Lake Superior environment. While the discovery of Morgan's connection sheds light onto her own family mysteries, the faded pages of the journals hold more questions than answers for Elizabeth, and threaten the very core of who she is. Combining an emotional story of human connection with a mystery spanning decades, this tale of family, identity, and art will captivate and resonate with readers.


Hudson River Lighthouses

Hudson River Lighthouses

Author: Hudson River Maritime Museum

Publisher: Arcadia Publishing

Published: 2019

Total Pages: 128

ISBN-13: 1467103306

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Lighthouses were built on the Hudson River in New York between 1826 to 1921 to help guide freight and passenger traffic. One of the most famous was the iconic Statue of Liberty. This fascinating history with photos will bring the time of traffic along the river alive. Set against the backdrop of purple mountains, lush hillsides, and tidal wetlands, the lighthouses of the Hudson River were built between 1826 and 1921 to improve navigational safety on a river teeming with freight and passenger traffic. Unlike the towering beacons of the seacoasts, these river lighthouses were architecturally diverse, ranging from short conical towers to elaborate Victorian houses. Operated by men and women who at times risked and lost their lives in service of safe navigation, these beacons have overseen more than a century of extraordinary technological and social change. Of the dozens of historic lighthouses and beacons that once dotted the Hudson River, just eight remain, including the iconic Statue of Liberty, New York Harbor's great monument to freedom and immigration, which served as an official lighthouse between 1886 and 1902. Hudson River Lighthouses invites readers to explore these unique icons and their fascinating stories.