SS ''William C. Moreland'' was a long Great Lakes freighter that ran aground on

Sawtooth Reef Sawtooth may refer to: Science and technology * Tooth of a saw blade (original meaning) * Sawtooth wave, a type of waveform * Sawtooth (cellular automaton) * Tokamak sawtooth, a phenomenon in plasma physics * Sawtooth, code name for the Power Mac G ...

Lake Superior Lake Superior in central North America is the largest freshwater lake in the world by surface areaThe Caspian Sea is the largest lake, but is saline, not freshwater. and the third-largest by volume, holding 10% of the world's surface fresh wa ...

on 18 October 1910, only a month after entering service. Visibility was poor due to the smoke from several forest fires, causing the ''William C. Moreland'' to ran full steam onto a reef. There were many attempts to salvage the ship, but eventually only the long stern was salvaged and was used to build the long . ''Sir Trevor Dawson'' was christened on 18 October 1916, exactly six years after ''William C. Moreland'' wrecked. ''Sir Trevor Dawson'' continued to sail for fifty-four years until she was

scrapped Scrap consists of recyclable materials, usually metals, left over from product manufacturing and consumption, such as parts of vehicles, building supplies, and surplus materials. Unlike waste, scrap has monetary value, especially recovered me ...

in 1970, in Spain as the steamer ''Parkdale''.

History

In 1906 the Jones and Laughlin Steel Company commissioned two long freighters named and both named after the company's founders, and both built by the

Great Lakes Engineering Works The Great Lakes Engineering Works (GLEW) was a leading shipbuilding company with a shipyard in Ecorse, Michigan, that operated between 1902 and 1960. Within three years of its formation, it was building fifty percent of the tonnage of all ships ...

(GLEW) of

Ecorse, Michigan Ecorse ( ') is a city in Wayne County in the U.S. state of Michigan. The population was 9,512 at the 2010 census. Ecorse is part of the Downriver community within Metro Detroit. The city shares a northwestern border with the city of Detroit ...

. The large fleet was managed by W.H. Becker, a prominent fleet manager and owner from

Cleveland, Ohio Cleveland ( ), officially the City of Cleveland, is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Cuyahoga County. Located in the northeastern part of the state, it is situated along the southern shore of Lake Erie, across the U.S. ...

. Due to the increasing demand for

iron ore Iron ores are rocks and minerals from which metallic iron can be economically extracted. The ores are usually rich in iron oxides and vary in color from dark grey, bright yellow, or deep purple to rusty red. The iron is usually found in the fo ...

Jones and Laughlin Steel Company commissioned two identical vessels; ''William C. Moreland'' from the

American Shipbuilding Company The American Ship Building Company was the dominant shipbuilder on the Great Lakes before the World War II, Second World War. It started as Cleveland Shipbuilding in Cleveland, Ohio in 1888 and opened the yard in Lorain, Ohio in 1898. It changed ...

(AMSHIP) and from the

(GLEW). They were identical in every respect and had a length of and a 12.000 cargo capacity. It was reported that ''William C. Moreland'' was the last launching of the year at AMSHIP's

Lorain, Ohio Lorain () is a city in Lorain County, Ohio, United States. The municipality is located in northeastern Ohio on Lake Erie, at the mouth of the Black River, about 30 miles west of Cleveland. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 65 ...

yard. Miss Esther Moreland of Pittsburgh christened the new vessel. She was the niece of the vessel's namesake, a prominent Pittsburgh attorney who was a vice-president and secretary of Jones and Laughlin Steel Company. On August 23, 1910 ''William C. Moreland'' was temporarily enrolled at

and assigned a U.S. official identification number U.S. #207851 for delivery to Jones and Laughlin's Interstate Steamship Company fleet. ''William C. Moreland'' cost nearly $450,000, she was 600 feet in

overall length The overall length (OAL) of an ammunition cartridge is a measurement from the base of the brass shell casing to the tip of the bullet, seated into the brass casing. Cartridge overall length, or "COL", is important to safe functioning of reloads in ...

( between perpendiculars) with a

beam Beam may refer to: Streams of particles or energy *Light beam, or beam of light, a directional projection of light energy **Laser beam *Particle beam, a stream of charged or neutral particles **Charged particle beam, a spatially localized grou ...

of feet and a depth of feet and measured at 7,514 gross register tons and 5,803

net register tons Net register tonnage (NRT, nrt, n.r.t.) is a ship's cargo volume capacity expressed in "register tons", one of which equals to a volume of . It is calculated by subtracting non-revenue-earning spaces i.e. spaces not available for carrying cargo, ...

. The she was powered by a

triple-expansion steam engine A compound steam engine unit is a type of steam engine where steam is expanded in two or more stages. A typical arrangement for a compound engine is that the steam is first expanded in a high-pressure ''(HP)'' cylinder, then having given up he ...

and fueled by two

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when dea ...

-fired Scotch marine boilers. She had an arch frame construction and three cargo holds with 36 cargo hatches placed on centers. ''William C. Moreland'' was Jones and Laughlin's largest ship at the time of her construction. ''William C. Moreland'' usually carried coal when she was upbound and iron ore when she was downbound.

Final voyage

On her fifth trip ''William C. Moreland'' left

Superior, Wisconsin , native_name_lang = oj , nickname = , total_type = , motto = , image_skyline = Tower Avenue.jpg , imagesize = , image_caption = Downtown Superior , ima ...

during the early hours October 18, 1910 with 10,700 tons of iron ore bound for

Ashtabula, Ohio Ashtabula ( ) is a city in Ashtabula County, Ohio, Ashtabula County, Ohio, United States, and the center of the United States micropolitan area, Ashtabula micropolitan area. It is located at the mouth of the Ashtabula River on Lake Erie, nort ...

. The weather on

was relatively mild with little or no wind or wave action, but visibility was hampered by smoke coming from several forest fires burning on the

Keweenaw Peninsula The Keweenaw Peninsula ( , sometimes locally ) is the northernmost part of Michigan's Upper Peninsula. It projects into Lake Superior and was the site of the first copper boom in the United States, leading to its moniker of "Copper Country." As o ...

Michigan's Upper Peninsula The Upper Peninsula of Michigan – also known as Upper Michigan or colloquially the U.P. – is the northern and more elevated of the two major landmasses that make up the U.S. state of Michigan; it is separated from the Lower Peninsula by t ...

. Vast stretches of brush and forests were burning on the peninsula due to drought-like conditions in the area causing severe visibility problems. Approaching the Keweenaw Peninsula about 17 hours after she left port the first mate, unsure of ''William C. Moreland''s position sighted an unidentified beam of white light. He called Captain Claude Ennes to the

bridge A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somethi ...

at about 9:00 at night. A few minutes later ''William C. Moreland'' ran aground Sawtooth Reef.

Salvage efforts

The hull of ''William C. Moreland'' remained intact until October 20, 1910 when the ship broke in two between the tenth and eleventh hatch due to the pressure the hull was under. Further cracking occurred near hatch 23 due to the enormous strain put on the hull by the flooded and loaded cargo holds and the unsupported midsection. The salvage rights were eventually sold to the Reid Wrecking Company of

Sarnia Sarnia is a city in Lambton County, Ontario, Canada. It had a 2021 population of 72,047, and is the largest city on Lake Huron. Sarnia is located on the eastern bank of the junction between the Upper and Lower Great Lakes where Lake Huron fl ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

. The Reid Wrecking Company managed to salvage the -long

stern The stern is the back or aft-most part of a ship or boat, technically defined as the area built up over the sternpost, extending upwards from the counter rail to the taffrail. The stern lies opposite the bow, the foremost part of a ship. Ori ...

of the ship, the -long bow stayed on the reef until it slid off and sank. The stern was reused as part of ''Sir Trevor Dawson''. On March 25, 1911, American Shipbuilding Company launched the -long freighter which was ordered by the Jones and Laughlin Steel Company to replace ''William C. Moreland''. ''Thomas Walters'' sailed until 1984 when she was

in Ashtabula, Ohio.

''William C. Moreland'' wreck

The remains of ''William C. Moreland'' rest in of water. The wreck has been largely flattened by years of ice and wave action, but there is still a lot of machinery, and numerous pieces of her hull left on the wreck site. ''William C. Moreland''s wreck is part of the

Keweenaw Underwater Preserve The Keweenaw Underwater Preserve is a preservation area in the U.S. state of Michigan. Located in Lake Superior, it protects waters that lie offshore Keweenaw Peninsula. Keweenaw Point The Michigan Department of Environmental Quality, which over ...

References

External links

Diving the wreck of the Moreland
{{DEFAULTSORT:William C. Moreland, SS Great Lakes freighters 1910 ships Shipwrecks of Lake Superior Ships built in Lorain, Ohio Merchant ships of the United States Steamships of the United States Maritime incidents in 1910 Ships powered by a triple expansion steam engine Protected areas of Keweenaw County, Michigan Protected areas of Houghton County, Michigan Shipwrecks of the Michigan coast Wreck diving sites in the United States