Twenty years before the Titanic changed maritime history, another ship touted as the next great technological feat set sail on the Great Lakes. The Western Reserve was one of the first all-steel cargo ships to traverse the lakes.

Around 200 ships have sunk in Whitefish Bay, the same place where the Western Reserve broke apart. The most notable in the area happened in 1975 when the SS Edmund Fitzgerald, an American freighter, wrecked, killing 29 people on board.