140-year-old 'ghost ship' schooner F.J. King found in Lake Michigan
Researchers locate the intact hull of a three-masted cargo schooner off Wisconsin’s Door Peninsula after decades of searches
A team of shipwreck researchers has located the long-lost cargo schooner F.J. King, which sank in Lake Michigan in 1886 during a violent storm, the Wisconsin Historical Society and the Wisconsin Underwater Archaeology Association said. The wreck was found June 28 about a half-mile offshore from Bailey’s Harbor on Wisconsin’s Door Peninsula, an area that has been searched repeatedly for the vessel for decades.
The F.J. King was a 144-foot, three-masted cargo schooner built in Toledo, Ohio, in 1867. On Sept. 15, 1886, while carrying iron ore from Escanaba, Michigan, to Chicago, the vessel was struck by a severe gale and waves reported at up to 10 feet that ruptured the ship’s seams. The crew, led by Captain William Griffin, worked to pump water out of the hull as the stern deckhouse was blown away and papers were tossed into the air. The schooner sank around 2 a.m.; Griffin and his crew were rescued by a passing schooner and brought to Bailey’s Harbor.
Conflicting contemporary accounts of where the F.J. King went down and the shifting sands and shoals of Lake Michigan frustrated search efforts for more than a century. Hunters of the wreck since the 1970s reported coming up empty, and the vessel acquired a reputation as a “ghost ship.” The Wisconsin Underwater Archaeology Association said that the hull’s apparent intact condition surprised investigators, who had expected the iron ore cargo’s weight to have broken the ship into pieces.
Lead searcher Brandon Baillod said he concentrated on a two-square-mile sector guided by a lighthouse keeper’s 19th-century report, reasoning that Captain Griffin may have been disoriented in the storm when he reported the sinking location. Side-scan sonar detected a large object roughly 140 feet long about a half-mile from the keeper’s sighting; subsequent inspection confirmed the find. "A few of us had to pinch each other," Baillod said in the announcement. "After all the previous searches, we couldn’t believe we had actually found it, and so quickly."
The Wisconsin Historical Society and the Wisconsin Underwater Archaeology Association confirmed the discovery on Monday. The association, which documents and maps submerged cultural resources in Wisconsin waters, has reported five wreck discoveries in the past three years, including the steamer L.W. Crane in the Fox River at Oshkosh, the tugboat John Evenson and schooner Margaret A. Muir off Algoma, and the schooner Trinidad off Algoma in 2023.
The condition of the F.J. King’s hull and its precise archaeological context will determine next steps for documentation and any in situ preservation measures. Shipwrecks in the Great Lakes, where cold, fresh water can slow decay of wooden vessels, are of interest to maritime archaeologists for the information they provide about 19th-century shipbuilding, cargo transport and navigation hazards.
State and volunteer teams involved in the search said they will continue to document the site in consultation with the Wisconsin Historical Society and other authorities to ensure the wreck’s protection. The discovery adds to a growing record of submerged historic resources in Lake Michigan and provides a tangible link to the region’s maritime past more than a century after the F.J. King went down.