SS America (1898)

America (Official No. 107367) was a steel-hulled ship, built by the Detroit Dry Dock Company in Wyandotte at what is today the Wyandotte shores golf course and launched on April 2, 1898. The ship was 184 feet long, 31 feet wide, and 11 feet in depth. She had a gross tonnage of 486 tons and a net of 283 tons. She was powered by a triple expansion steam engine and two Scotch boilers, manufactured by the Dry Dock Engine Works, delivering 700HP. Less than a month after her launch, America began a daily run, transporting passengers and packages on Lake Michigan between Chicago and Michigan City, Indiana. The ship remained on this run until 1901; in 1902 she was purchased by the Booth Steamship Company and transferred to service in Lake Superior. The beam and depth remained the same. The rework added 12 more staterooms, bringing the total to 51, of which 43 were reserved for passengers. In 1914, management of the ship was taken over by the United States & Dominion Transportation Company, a subsidiary of Booth. Also in 1914, America again ran aground, taking considerable damage. On 7 June 1924, she struck a reef, capsized, and sank off Isle Royale, Michigan; all 47 people aboard survived, and she was refloated, repaired, and returned to service. In 1926, she collided with another steamer, and in 1927 rammed the dock and grounded while coming into port. ==Wreck==

On June 6, 1928, America steamed out of Duluth on her normal route. She arrived in Isle Royale's Washington Harbor in the early morning hours of June 7 to drop off passengers, and left again before dawn. Once the ship had cleared the dock, the captain turned over the helm to the first mate. Five minutes later, America hit a submerged reef as she was leaving Washington Harbor. Although the captain returned to the helm and attempted to beach her, America ran aground on a second reef. All 16 passengers and 31 crew aboard were successfully transported to lifeboats. Within an hour, America had settled to the bottom in the north gap of Washington Harbor, leaving only her bow, forward deck, and wheelhouse above the waterline. Efforts were made to re-float the ship, but the bidding process was delayed, and a salvage company was not lined up until 1929. Over the winter of 1928-29, the wheelhouse was sheared off and the ship was shifted by the ice to sit lower in the water. By that time, it was thought that raising the wreck would not be financially feasible, and indeed, the salvage company was never able to raise the capital required to raise the wreck. A group of divers in the 1960s attempted to raise America and bring her to Duluth for service as a museum ship. This later attempt was also unsuccessful due to Lake Superior storms and, it was rumored, sabotage by a diver who wanted America to stay where she was. ==The wreck today==

America lies along a steep underwater cliff, with the wreckage sitting as deep as 85 feet to as shallow as only two feet to the surface, The pressure from the number of dives and the lake motion near the surface has caused the wreck to deteriorate. In 1996, the GLSPS repaired one of the ship's interior walls, and they have reattached other pieces and otherwise worked to stabilize the ship. ==See also==