Reflections on the Edmund Fitzgerald Story and Gordon Lightfoot’s Haunting Ballad

Many stories remain in memories, as do many events. Therefore, my first question is, “Is the event, the wreck, on its own, enough to hold our attention for this long? Or is it the compelling story that has stayed with us because of the way it is told?”

Due to the Americana of the stories (and the test of time), my first parallels come from the American Old West. Wild Bill Hickok was killed holding what came to be known to this day as “The Dead Man’s Hand,” which is two pair, aces and eights.

Jesse James and his gang rode north in a failed plan to rob Minnesota banks known now as “The Northfield Raid.” Billy the Kid, a sobriquet acquired because of the age of William Bonney (an alias of Henry McCarty), is portrayed as an American outlaw of varying colors.

These stories all survived through dime novels and lasted at least long enough for Hollywood—the greatest engine of Americana storytelling—to pick up the scent and carry the ball forward.

As Great Lakes shipwrecks historian Thom Holden notes in his essay, the Edmund Fitzgerald’s story holds all the tension and tragedy of a Hollywood mystery.