The Sailing Adventures of Captain Edward E. Martin (1869 - 1962)
His First and Only Home in Bay View (1934-37)
2747 South Ellen Street
His Ships and Sailing Adventures While Living at 2747 S. Ellen St.
Above: The car ferry Madison, 1934-37 at this address (though captain overall from 1927-37); Sailing adventures while captain: captain on its maiden voyage in 1927. Photo courtesy Kenneth Thro, the Alpena County George N. Fletcher Public Library, Thunder Bay Research Collection.
His Ships and Sailing Adventures Before Bay View
Unknown: 1885-97, ships and position aboard unknown
Unknown: 1898-1903, ships unknown but confirmed captain
Above left: the passenger liner Tionesta, 1904 (possible if not probable captain 1902 when built through 1905); captain; Sailing adventures while captain: he was first to sail it to Milwaukee in October 1904 where 10,000 people toured it and it hosted dignitaries of Milwaukee, including the mayor, to promote Great Lakes maritime commerce. Postcard courtesy the Alpena County George N. Fletcher Public Library, Thunder Bay Research Collection.
Above right: the passenger liner Juniata, 1906-09; captain; Sailing adventures while captain: none discovered, though likely captained it on its maiden voyage. Postcard courtesy the Alpena County George N. Fletcher Public Library, Thunder Bay Research Collection.
Above left: the passenger liner Octorara, 1910-18; captain; Sailing adventures while captain: captained it on its maiden voyage in 1910; on 06 October 1916, while the ship was underway in Lake Huron enroute Duluth, Minnesota, a fire broke out in the cargo hold containing a load of oakum and burned for three hours until the crew was able to put it out. 39 Photo courtesy the Edward J. Dowling Collection, University of Detroit-Mercy; the Alpena County George N. Fletcher Public Library, Thunder Bay Research Collection.
Above right: the steam freighter Allegheny, 1919-21; captain; Sailing adventures while captain: none discovered. Photo courtesy F. E. Hamilton, the Alpena County George N. Fletcher Public Library, Thunder Bay Research Collection.
Above left: the passenger liner Grand Haven, 1922-26; captain; Sailing adventures while captain: The night of 20 August 1924, collided with and sank a small ferry boat being used to transport people from Jones Island to the Greenfield Avenue landing. One person drowned, to were saved from the water. The small boat did not have lights. Captain Martin was out on the bridge wing when he sighted the small craft in the dark just before hitting it but there was nothing that could have been done to avoid the collision. 40 On 27 January 1925, arrived many hours past due into Milwaukee from Muskegon. Was the subject of a photo essay in the Milwaukee Sentinel showing it completely coated in ice. “Ice hung to every portion of the ship. Spray had drenched the vessel and the waves were running so high that a wild duck, too fatigued to fight the storm, was washed aboard and caught in a companionway. The bird was revived and released.” 41 Photo courtesy Kenneth Thro, the Alpena County George N. Fletcher Public Library, Thunder Bay Research Collection.
Above center: the car ferry Madison, 1927-32 (until he moves to Bay View in 1934, total command duration 1927-37); Sailing adventures while captain: captained it on its maiden voyage on 03 March 1927, to Milwaukee. 42 In early April 1927, collided with the fishing boat Tessler nine miles off Milwaukee on Lake Michigan. “The starboard bows of the sixty-ton fishing boat and the car ferry came together almost without warning. The shock rolled the smaller vessel onto its port beam. Bay View Lake Captain (and future neighbor of Edward Martin’s) Charles Tessler, at the wheel of the Tessler at the time, was cut by flying glass as every window in the pilot house broke. The crew were all thrown down but were uninjured. Damage to the fishing boat consisted of crushed steel frames on the starboard bow, a smashed lifeboat, and sprung frames. It was able to limp into port unassisted.” 43 In February 1928, was rescued by Captain Robert H. McKay of the car ferry City of Milwaukee who perished along with 46 other crew during a storm a year later in late October 1929. McKay’s rescue of Captain Martin and the crew of the Madison was recounted to reporters by the Madison’s crewman James H. Lahey (of Milwaukee) shortly after McKay went down on the City of Milwaukee: “I was a seaman on the Madison. We had fought through the ice (but) were unable to get into Grand Haven, Michigan. With a 40 mile-an-hour gale blowing we couldn’t get out of the icefield that was five miles all around us. We were carried aground helpless. The Coast Guard tried for two days to get a line on board. McKay had come along on the Milwaukee…he saw how useless it was to attempt to jam through that ice (surrounding the Madison) which was 10 feet thick, so he stood by for three days ready to act if the Madison got into any worse condition. Without endangering his own ship, he waited until the gale died down and then he plowed through the ice and, by working both propellers, dredged out the sand bar that had formed beneath us got lines aboard, and hauled us off (the sand bar) with the aid of the car ferry Grand Haven. It was his waiting and acting at just the right time that saved us. It would have been walking into the mouth of death had he pushed his rescue too soon in that shallow water…” 44 Stated to a reporter years later that the storm of late October 1929, which he sailed through in the Madison (and took 16 hours to cross Lake Michigan from Grand Haven to Milwaukee) and that sank the car ferry Milwaukee with the loss of 47 men (and which his son Roland been crewman aboard just one month prior), was “just a dirty blow.” 45 On 25 January 1929, saved the lives of 10 fishermen stranded in ice in their two fishing boats off the coast of Grand Haven, Michigan. The rescue took five hours using the skilled seamanship of Captain Martin to free the boats from the ice without crushing or toppling the. Finally, when rescue was at hand, the fishermen had been without food for so long and suffering from exposure that they could barely handle the rescue lines thrown to them from the Madison. When interviewed by a reporter about it later, Captain Martin said, it was “nothing,” and that “I’m glad I could do it.” 46 Photo courtesy Kenneth Thro, the Alpena County George N. Fletcher Public Library, Thunder Bay Research Collection.
Above right: the car ferry Grand Rapids, 1933 (a one-year stint before returning as captain of the Madison when he moved to Bay View in 1934); Sailing adventures while captain: “…the night of 09 February 1933, when a high wind and seas caused his and two other car ferries to crash against pierheads at east shore ports. Although the gale’s direction coincided with the course, the Grand Rapids angled across the wind to avoid broaching-to. But entering the harbor necessitated a direct course. A yawning sea caught the stern of the car ferry and twisted it uncontrollably. The Grand Rapids struck the south pier, stove in its bow, and settled crosswise in the channel on a sand bar. ‘Two hours we wallowed there…almost rolling the rails under, with hardly any room between the piers to back up or go ahead. The Muskegon coast guards were ready to set up the breeches buoy to take the crew off…(but the ship) worked loose and went to drydock the next day.’ ” 47 On 09 March 1933, was “swept upon a sand bar while trying to make (port) at Grand Haven, Michigan. The ship freed itself, however, and steamed into port without aid. 48 Photo courtesy Kenneth Thro, the Alpena County George N. Fletcher Public Library, Thunder Bay Research Collection.
