Shipwrecks of the Great Lakes: Tragedies and Legacies from the Inland Seas by Anna Lardinois
2022; Volume: 48; Issue: 2 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1353/mhr.2022.0043
ISSN2327-9672
Autores Tópico(s)History of Science and Medicine
ResumoReviewed by: Shipwrecks of the Great Lakes: Tragedies and Legacies from the Inland Seas by Anna Lardinois Mark Thompson Anna Lardinois. Shipwrecks of the Great Lakes: Tragedies and Legacies from the Inland Seas. Lanham, MD: Globe Pequot, 2021. Pp. 205. Illustrations. Index. Bibliography. Glossary. Paperback: $19.95. Author Anna Lardinois describes herself as “a maritime disaster enthusiast,” and in the introduction to her Shipwrecks of the Great Lakes, she confesses that the book “is not a mariners’ guide” but a collection of “swashbuckling tales of peril, loss, and survival,” offering a “bite-sized look at some of the most notable disasters” that have occurred on the Great Lakes. Elements of her day job as owner of Milwaukee’s “most popular haunted, historical walking tour company” also introduce a paranormal specter to a number of the shipwrecks, although she has kept the ghosts and goblins to a tolerable minimum. The twenty-eight breezy vignettes included in the book range in length from two pages of text for the story of the 1780 wreck of HMS Ontario to twelve pages for the 1958 foundering of the SS Carl D. Bradley in a November storm on Lake Michigan. Several stories are accompanied by images of the vessels involved. Wrecks are included for each of the five Great Lakes, ranging from four from Lake Huron to seven each from Lake Michigan and Lake Superior. Lardinois’ selection of casualties for inclusion also provides examples of wrecks resulting from all the major causes, including fires and boiler explosions, groundings, collisions, and founderings—often storm related. If you are new to Great Lakes shipwreck stories, of if you are merely looking for some easy, interesting reading, you might find Shipwrecks of the Great Lakes entertaining. It might even turn you on to the expansive and ever-growing Great Lakes shipwreck genre. Lardinois credits the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum with claiming that “at least six thousand shipwrecks” have taken place on America’s inland seas since the Griffon disappeared somewhere east of Green Bay, Wisconsin, in 1679. (I actually think the total is more in the area of 25,000 shipwrecks.) That gives writers of shipwreck books [End Page 126] an almost endless supply of material to work with. (The last major casualty on the Great Lakes was the 1975 sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald.) Books about shipwrecks on the Great Lakes vary significantly in quality. The author’s candid warning to prospective readers that her book may not meet some unspecified standard for books in the Great Lakes shipwrecks genre is not misplaced. I applaud her for her interest in the subject but believe that her book violates one of the basic rules for authors and prospective authors: Write what you know. The often-ignored corollary to that is: If you don’t know, learn. The amount of space allocated for this review is inadequate to document the many mistakes that have crept into the book because the author did not have an adequate knowledge of her subject matter. Mark Thompson Author, Graveyard of the Lakes, A Sailor’s Logbook, Queen of the Lakes, and Steamboats and Sailors of the Great Lakes Copyright © 2022 Historical Society of Michigan
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