The artifacts are located in the Old Mission Lighthouse.
Metropolis. The 125' schooner Metropolis became lost in a snow storm in November 1886 and ran aground south of Old Mission Point. Her cargo of pig iron and lumber was salvaged. However, the ship was abandoned to the weather. The remains of the Metropolis are divided into a shallow debris field just offshore in only about 8 feet of water and a deeper portion of the hull in 120 feet of water.
Misadventures Aboard the Metropolis
Originally published in the Traverse City Record-Eagle, Northern Seasons supplement, August 20, 1998
Snowflakes swirled around the hull of the schooner Metropolis as she pulled out of Elk Rapids late one night on November 26, 1886, loaded with rough-sewn pine boards and pig-iron.
Had Captain Duncan Corbett known that this blustery night would signal the proud sailing vessel’s last voyage, he never would have attempted this one last run to Chicago before winter set in.
But the frigid waters of Lake Michigan beckoned, and the 124.7-foot schooner set out on her journey only to run aground near Old Mission Point around 3 a.m. Captain Corbett and crew managed to scramble ashore.
Though there was a heavy northwest gale, an attempt was made to salvage the vessel, and a wrecking tug was brought in from Cheboygan. After two days, however, they abandoned the effort, and the Metropolis would soon succumb to the crushing weight of the bay’s ice. So ended her days on the Great Lakes.
According to marine historian Chester Reddeman, the Metropolis was built in 1857 by the Peck and Masters Shipyard in Cleveland, Ohio, and launched in April of that year. Her owners, W.T. Richmond and Captain John Waters, registered her home port as Chicago. Captain Waters would command her during that first season, making regular lumber runs between Buffalo and Chicago.
During her 29-year career, the Metropolis was plagued by many mishaps. In October of her first year, she went ashore on Middle Island in Lake Huron. In November, 1867, she again went aground, this time near Waugoshance in Lake Michigan, and was reported to be a total loss after breaking in two. The report was unfounded, however, and the schooner was later discovered to have released herself; apparently, part of her cargo of grain washed overboard, lightening the vessel enough to re-float her.
In September, 1871, she lost her fore-topmast in a Lake Michigan squall. The following year, fully laden with coal, she struck a reef at Hog Island near the Straits. Once again, the vessel suffered only minimal damage, arriving at her Chicago destination a day or two later. And, in October, 1873, her sails were damaged in a Lake Michigan gale, and she put into port for repairs.
In an essay on the schooner written in 1983, Michael Neumann cited another incident: “On December 7, 1883, the Metropolis left Elk Rapids for Chicago with a cargo of miscellaneous goods. Though clearing port with a fair wind, she got no farther than the Leelanau Peninsula before encountering difficulties. Later that day, a dispatch was received from Northport, by the Elk Rapids Progress, stating that a schooner ‘closely resembling the Metropolis‘ was ashore at Light House Point and that her deckload of lumber was being jettisoned. It was later ascertained that the location was just south of Light House Point, at ‘Weiderman’s.’ The loss to vessel and cargo was reported at $150.
By this time, Captain Corbett was manning the vessel. Though a resident of Chicago, Corbett also maintained a home on River Street in Elk Rapids.
In September of that year, Corbett’s brother, John, fell victim to the vessel’s curse. While the Metropolis was being loaded with pig-iron at the Dexter-Noble docks at Elk Rapids, John fell through an open hatch. Several pigs of iron plummeted on top of him before anyone realized his predicament, but he survived the incident with only a broken leg and a number of bruises.
After the loss of the Metropolis, Captain Corbett purchased the three-masted schooner Waukesha, formerly the Nabob, and operated her on runs between Elk Rapids, Chicago and Cleveland. In November, 1896, ten years to the month after losing the Metropolis, the Waukesha foundered at her anchorage during a heavy gale at Muskegon. Of the seven crew members, six were lost, including Captain Corbett.
Dr. Ed Wright, a local historian and Old Mission resident, noted that although the Metropolis seemed to be jinxed, maritime mishaps were common in those days due to the lack of modern equipment. “The schooners didn’t have the aids that modern vessels have now,” he said.
According to “Fredrickson’s Treasure Chart of Lost Ships and Cargos in the Frankfort, Michigan Area,” there were 202 maritime mishaps of one kind or another between Grand Traverse Bay and a little south of Ludington. Of those, 160 involved schooners or brigs – sailing vessels of the 1800s.
Many of the wrecks can be attributed to captains trying to make one last voyage before winter set in. “It was their living, and they wanted to make their last voyage and earn that last possible amount of money,” Wright observed.
According to Old Mission resident Bill Hyslop, all that remains of the Metropolis is a skeleton keel and ribs. On a clear, sunny day, she can be easily seen in her final resting place about 200 yards off shore.
Before it became illegal to rob pieces from sunken vessels, divers picked the schooner clean, using the materials to craft everything from coffee tables to lamps.
Wright once received a gift of a pen holder with a wooden base reputed to be from the Metropolis. Hyslop used white oak from the hull to make flooring in a log cabin he built in the woods. And a barn at the top of a nearby bluff [the Ridgewood] was reportedly built from the vessel’s cargo of rough-sewn pine boards shortly after it ran aground.
The remains of the once proud Metropolis now serve as a home for rock bass.
Jane Johnson Boursaw
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A lifelong resident of the Old Mission Peninsula, Jane grew up on a cherry farm (Johnson Farms), married the boy next door (Tim Boursaw), and raised two kids there (Will and Marissa). Her 35-year career as a photojournalist includes bylines with the New York Times and Ladies' Home Journal, and interviews with Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts. But she loves writing about the OMP most of all.