“Pioneer Illinois Shipwreck Hunter and Scuba Diver Paul Ehorn is pleased to announce the discovery of one of Lake Michigan’s most sought-after missing ships. The passenger steamer Lac La Belle had been missing in the depths of Lake Michigan since a stormy night in October of 1872. Ehorn located her upright, intact hull almost 150 years to the day after her loss. The Lac La Belle was one of the most popular passenger steamers on Lake Michigan,” says a press release posted to ShipwreckWorld.com on the massive development in the world of long-lost steamship hunting.
The Lac La Belle’s loss itself was not actually deadly. Technically all 53 passengers and crew on board survived its sinking but eight died when one of the lifeboats capsized. That low death toll, amount of time passed, and the not-particularly-dramatic circumstances around the sinking are probably why the Lac La Belle’s obscure even to those familiar with wrecks like the 1975 loss of the freighter Edmund Fitzgerald and the 1902 sinking of the John B Cowle. You know, ship dorks.