The Great Lakes are the only geographic feature of the United States recognizable from space. They are inland oceans in their size and characteristics but have developed their own unique style of shipping design. In recent years the "1000 footers" have departed from traditional design and look like blue water bulk freighters. However, this is a VERY recent trend and there are far more of the old style boats operating on the Lakes and they will be with us for many years to come. Of the various distinctive types developed for Great Lakes transportation the most commonly known is the ore freighter. The kit of the EDMUND FITZGERALD is a fairly recent version of a design style that has changed very little in 100 years. The size has increased dramatically but the look has remained the same. Basically these vessels are arranged with engines aft, pilot house forward, with a long expanse of deck and cargo hatches connecting the two. The cargo hold is a long rectangular box with no bulkheads. Ore is loaded into the holds in bulk from overhead chutes. Size increases came in increments with all contemporay builders using basically the same sizes in different tine periods. The reason was simple. Ship size was governed by the width of the canal locks connecting the Lakes. When the canals were widened, the boats grew. Generally they were built to a ratio of about 1:10 (beam to length) with the beam determined by the width of the canal locks. Thus the vessel shown in this plan is representative of ore boats (Lakers are called "boats", no matter how big they are) operating on the Lake system during the twenties and thirties.

Their primary cargo in those days was high grade iron ore. The Masabe Range was one of the richest deposits on the globe in both size and purity. It was a massive surface deposit (literally mountains of the stuff) and easy to mine. This natural resource was one of the primary reasons for the dominance of the American steel industry before World WarII. In the hold of most of the lake freighters today you will find a cargo of taconite pellets. The EDMUND FITZGERALD was a taconite carrier, built for this purpose. Taconite is a processed low grade ore, high in surfure content, mainly suitable for rebar. Of that once seemingly inexhaustable supply, very little high grade iron ore is left. The huge mass production effort mounted in World WarII denuded the Masabe Range, striping away the rich ore, and no significant deposit has been found to take its place. It should be no mystery as to why the American steel and ship building industry is no longer able to compete in the world market. American heavy industry remained competitive with foreign manufacturers (even with higher labor costs) as long as this rich ore lasted and steel could be produced cheaply. The high grade ore was still flowing in the 1950-60 period, but now required much greater effort (and expense) to mine. The weakened United States economic position today is thus directly tied to the sacrifice of a unique natural resource for the massive material effort required in winning the Second World War. Boats like this one, in their hundreds, moved the ore to the steel foundries, thence to the defence plants.

Ore boats typically were painted with black hulls, white upper works, with either iron oxide (brick red) or black cargo decks. Superstructure decks were typically unpainted wood. Life boats were white. Some companies emblazoned their narne in large white letters on the hulls but most were far more conservative. Distinctive markings were usually limited to the funnel colors, which was the identification feature for most shipping companies operating on the Lakes.

1/700 Scale Drawings

Edmund Fitzgerald

This article originally appeared in Plastic Ship Modeler 1997/1 and is reprinted here with the permission of the author and editor.

Copyright © SMML 2003