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Great Lakes Shipping

Downward Bound - Great Lakes Shipping 1767
This site features a database of Captains of the ships that sailed the Great Lakes. New biography and obituary boards of those who worked on the Great Lakes. Many historical articles along with an index of all the biographies contained in the 2nd volume of History of The Great Lakes pub. 1899. Many books are indexed for surnames and contained plus a bibliography of references to get you started in your search.

Ship Information Database 1497
Canadian based list you can search by ship name - owner - captain or date.

Great Lakes and Seaway Shipping 1422
The ultimate in shipping sites.

Immigrants to Canada 1355
Quebec ship information. List of ships, passengers and a lot of history of the area.

Maritime History of the Great Lakes 1347
Newspaper transcriptions, historical articles going online. This project has many volunteers who are contributing data to the site. Updated frequently and holds many names.

Biographies, Obituaries and News Articles of GL Shipping Online 1215
Downward Bound's boards created so you can put your biographies, obituaries and news articles online and contribute data to the Great Lakes Shipping online community of researchers. These are also searchable and readable to the public.

State Archives of Michigan 1161
Check the list of circulars of material available at the archives for research. Circular #46 list Shipping and Navigation holdings. The archives are located in the Michigan Historical Ctr. along with the Library of Michigan which houses many other records important to researchers.

Great Lakes Shipwreck File: Total Losses of Great Lakes Ships 1679 - 1999 1113
David Swayze's database of shipwrecks on the Great Lakes. Searchable database with references to the sources are noted. Also, there is a look up offer in a database of over 5000 deaths on the lakes!

The Saginaw River Marine 1110
The Saginaw River Marine Historical Society is a non-profit organization dedicated to the preservation and appreciation of the history of the Saginaw River and connecting waters. The Society was founded in 1989 by a group of dedicated individuals interested in preserving the rich maritime heritage of the Saginaw River Valley and Saginaw Bay.

Great Lakes Ships & Shipping- Small Beginnings... 1100
Full Title: Great Lakes Ships & Shipping Small Beginnings of a Wonderful Maritime Industry - 1899 - Good article about the first ships on the lakes with a history of how it happened.

Schooner Helena at the Bottom of the Soo River 1052
Schooner Helena at the Bottom of the Soo River - 30 July 1891 Copy of a news article. This contains names!

Historical Collections of the Great Lakes 1017
Located at Bowling Green University in Ohio. Hours, online images of ships database, research announcements.

Bowling Green State University Archives 983
Bowling Green State Library's catalog which is searchable online. Bowling Green is the home of Historical Collections of the Great Lakes and considered one of the largest repositories for shipping records on the Great Lakes.

Library of Michigan Search Engine Site 969
Search the catalog of the Library of Michigan.

Martime and Naval Links of Canada 957
List of links ordered by province and includes those surrounding the Great Lakes.

Wisconsin Marine Historical Society 925
is dedicated to discovering, collecting, recording and preserving materials related to Great Lakes Maritime history. The Society and the Milwaukee Public Library have jointly developed one of the most important depositories of Great Lakes historical materials in existence. Their web site has on-line searchable index data bases for 7600 Great Lakes vessel files including some 21,000+ photos, the U.S. Custom Services Great Lakes vessel enrollment records for the period 1815-1915 (40,000 records for 24,000 vessels). In addition the web-site has information on its other resources which may be of help to historians, educators, shipwreck researchers, genealogist and those interested in Great Lakes history.

Marine Museum of the Great Lakes at Kingston, Canada 864
Well done collection of searchable online databases for shipping enthusiasts. Do your initial research online and then go to their archives to get the material you need for your records.

Lake Carriers' Association 861
LAKE CARRIERS' ASSOCIATION is a trade association for the shipping industry on the Great Lakes.

Great Lakes Shipwreck Research 857
Research newsgroup area, links to databases online.

Great Lakes Historical Society 849
Research society that publishes Inland Seas and is located in Ohio.

Lake Erie Shipwrecks 842
Shipwreck locations and diving information.

Great lakes Lights 838
Beautiful! Photos of Great Lakes Lighthouses.

Rutherford B. Hayes Pres. Ctr. 831
This library has records on shipping on the Great Lakes. Located in Ohio.

Wisconsin Historical Society 815
The Society possesses one of the largest genealogical collections in the country. The collection is not limited to Wisconsin history and genealogy but includes family and local history material pertaining to all regions of North America.

Milwaukee Public Library 808
Special Collections - Page contains the link to Great Lakes Marine Collection. Searchable by ship, person's name, or place.

Great Lakes Lighthouse Keepers Association 805
This society's purpose is to facilitate the accumulation and exchange of information about the histories of the lighthouses and their keepers so that life at these stations may be accurately interpreted, their histories preserved, and a new generation of preservationists developed.

Captain Gus Goransson 777
This is a web site which talks about the career of one Great Lakes captain who worked for Ford out of the Rouge plant. Describes what runs from Dearborn to Duluth were like as well as the personal history of one of the lakes most well known captains during the heyday of lake cargo freighters. Information on when Ford changed the name of one of their ships to Benson Ford.

Lake Superior Marine Museum Association 764
Publishes The Nor'Easter bi-monthly, which has many articles on shipping along with great historical articles on individuals and ships.

Joseph Nau's Middle Island Lighthouse Site 757
Middle Island Lighthouse Keepers Association Member and created a site about the history of the lighthouse and family information on the keeper Wilber Ranville.

Car Ferries of Ludington 754
Features articles on carferry history of the Great Lakes. Provides links to other carferry sites of interest.

Captain Timothy Rahill 750
Captain Timothy Rahill - obituary, photo, and family history

Great Lakes Shipwreck Research Foundation 743
This site has an annual seminar and an online searchable database of Great Lakes shipwrecks.

Northern Shipwrecks Database on CD 719
This CD contains the Great Lakes.

The Wexford - Elusive Wreck of 1913 688
This site centers on the Wexford with a history of the ship, description of her last voyage, and crew list.

Mackinac Bridge & Straits of Mackinac 658
Includes photos of Mackinac Bridge, Mackinaw City, Mackinac Island and Straits area lighthouses. New in 2003 is a significant genealogy resource including photos from Mackinaw's Lakeview Cemetery and lookups from "Memories of Mackinaw."

Steam Tug BALTIMORE 426
Inland Waterways Tugboat Page of the very last operational hand-fired coal-burning steam vessel in North America with ties to the Skinner and other Federal Hill Shipyards where many Great Lakes vessels were built and/or hauled up for repairs.

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If you have a favorite site that fits into this category, please take a few moments to add the link so other researchers may find it.  The only thing we ask is that the site contains actual free to the public genealogy data.  Sites that contain only links  or addresses will not be accepted.  If the site is commercial in some way but has data that is free to the public for viewing go ahead and list.  Sites that are purely commercial and want to advertise should contact the webmaster. 


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