Wreck of 19th-century luxury steamer found in Lake Michigan

Scuba diver John Janzen still remembers the moment when it all clicked that the shipwreck before him was indeed the Lac La Belle.

“One of the most distinctive features of the wreck is the arches that run along the length of the ship,” Janzen told As It Happens host Nil Köksal.

“We were told to look for those distinctive arches, and the moment we saw those, we were pretty confident we knew what the ship was.”

Janzen is part of a team led by Illinois shipwreck hunter Paul Ehorn that was searching for the luxury steamer, which sank in a Lake Michigan gale in 1872.

And in October of 2022, they found it. Shipwreck World, a group dedicated to finding historic wrecks worldwide, announced the discovery on Friday.

While the discovery happened years ago, the announcement was delayed because the team wanted to create a 3D model of the ship, but uncooperative weather and scheduling conflicts prevented additional dives to the wreck to get more footage.

How they found it

The discovery caps off a search that began over 60 years ago. Ehorn, now 80, has been hunting shipwrecks since he was 15.

His breakthrough came in 2022, after a clue from fellow wreck hunter and author Ross Richardson gave him information that narrowed his search area. While he wouldn’t say what that information was, Richardson did say that he learned a commercial fisherman at a “certain location” had nabbed an item “specific to steam ships from the 1800s.”

With this new information, Ehorn was able to locate the ship using side-scan sonar just two hours after heading out onto Lake Michigan.

“It’s kind of a game, like solve the puzzle. Sometimes you don’t have many pieces to put the puzzle together, but this one worked out and we found it right away,” said Ehorn.

What happened to Lac La Belle

It wasn’t the first time Lac La Belle had gone down.

According to an account published by Shipwreck World, the 217-foot steamer was built in 1864 in Cleveland. Two years later, it sank in the St. Clair River following a collision. But the passenger vessel was raised in 1869 and refurbished.

On the night of Oct. 13, 1872, Lac La Belle left Milwaukee and set sail for Grand Haven, Mich., with 53 passengers and crew aboard and a load of barley, pork, flour and whisky.

It began taking on water two hours later. Huge waves came crashing in, extinguishing her boilers. Passengers and crew boarded lifeboats and saw the ship sink down to its watery grave, stern-first.

One of the lifeboats capsized along the way, killing eight people. The others were able to make landfall along the Wisconsin shore.

Quagga mussels now cover the wreck’s exterior, but Jansen says all things considered, the vessel is still in good shape.

“It’s sitting upright. It’s in very good condition, except for the upper cabin structures and the pilot house structure are gone,” he said.

He said one propeller had broken off and lay on the lakebed nearby. Inside the wreck, divers also found evidence of its cargo.

“It was carrying whiskey and we found many barrels … but unfortunately, they were all falling to pieces,” Janzen said.

Great Lake wrecks

According to the University of Wisconsin-Madison’s Wisconsin Water Library, the Great Lakes are home to anywhere from 6,000 to 10,000 shipwrecks, most of which remain undiscovered.

In recent years, there’s been increased urgency among shipwreck hunters to locate these sites out of concern the invasive quagga mussels are slowly eating away at the wrecks. 

Janzen said he hopes that there are more shipwreck searches in the years to come — especially considering his boss, Ehorn, shows no signs of slowing down at 80.

“He says he’s got more targets to look at,” said Janzen. “So I hope he calls me again.

As for whether he believes the sailing lore that the twice-sunk Lac La Belle was truly cursed, Janzen is skeptical. He believes the force at work were far less mystical. 

“I think really what it is, is the Great Lakes can be a very harsh environment and the lakes are absolutely indifferent to human lives and ships and the expense and cost of cargo,” he said.

“The lake is just nature in its purest, rawest form and so it can be a very dangerous place and there’s no guarantee that you or your ship is going to be safe when it’s out there.”