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Ghost Ship Found In Lake Michigan After Countless Attempts Since The 1970s
The wreck of one of the most sought-after vessels in the Great Lakes has been discovered. This is the F.J. King, a schooner which sank in Lake Michigan almost 140 years ago.
The discovery was announced by the Wisconsin Underwater Archaeology Association (WUAA) on Monday.
According to reports, the vessel sank on September 15, 1886, during a storm off the coast of Baileys Harbor, Wisconsin.
The ghost ship had been missing for about 139 years, and several attempts were made to find its wreck site since the 1970s, said the WUAA in a release.
The Neptune Dive Club even issued a $1000 reward for anyone who found it. The vessel had developed the reputation of a ghost ship due to her elusiveness.
A WUAA team led by Brendon Baillod began their search on June 28, 2025, but had little hope of finding the wreck.
However, just two hours later, they saw an object which looked like a ship on the screen. They could see the hatches and, after measuring the ship, it was 140 feet long, the exact length of the F.J. King.
Baillod said that they could not believe it, as after all the earlier searches, they had not expected to find the vessel so quickly.
F.J. King was a 3-masted wooden schooner constructed in 1867 in Toledo by George Rogers. It was used for transporting grain and iron ore.
The ship encountered a gale off the Door Peninsula while it was sailing with iron ore from Escanaba, Michigan, to Chicago.
Waves as high as 8 to 10 feet ruptured her seams, and after many hours of pumping, Captain Willian Griffin ordered the men into the vessel’s yawl boat.
The schooner sank around 2:00 a.m., and a passing ship rescued the crew members and took them to Bailey’s harbor.
Baillod said that the ship’s hull was intact, which was a surprise since they expected it to be in pieces, given the weight of the iron ore it was carrying when it sank.
There are 6000 to 10,000 shipwrecks in the Great Lakes, most of which have not been found yet.
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