The Milwaukee was last seen passing by U.S. Lightship 95 (LV-95/WAL-519), a ship anchored three miles offshore, serving as a lighthouse. The Milwaukee was reported to be pitching and rolling heavily as it disappeared into the rainy mist.

routine
The ship did not have radio equipment. It was considered routine for the Milwaukee to challenge the storm. The theory is that its cargo of 25–27 railroad cars came loose in the 37 mph (32 kn; 60 km/h) gale and crashed through the sea gate, allowing water to come in over the stern and sink her. The captain, Robert H. McKay, apparently turned back for Milwaukee, but never made it.

A few members of the crew - some accounts say 52 died on the S.S. Milwaukee, others say it was 47 - managed to escape the 338-foot-long car ferry before it plunged to the bottom of Lake Michigan, along with its cargo of rail cars carrying bathtubs, automobiles, lumber, barley, canned peas and salt.

Four crew members fled in one of the lifeboats but it wasn't a refuge, only another vessel of death. Their bodies were found in the lifeboat four days after the ferry foundered.

Loacted in 1972
In April, 1972, the wreck was located in Lake Michigan, seven miles northeast of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, three miles offshore northeast of Atwater Beach sitting in 9 to 120 feet of water.

In March 2006, the television program Deep Sea Detectives on the History Channel premiered an episode entitled "Train Wreck of Lake Michigan" which profiled the loss of the Milwaukee through historical documents, interviews with historians and dives on the wreck itself.

The show highlighted the fact that there were missing hatch covers between the track deck and compartments below, including the engine room and the crew quarters (Flicker), that probably allowed those areas to become flooded and thus was a contributing factor to the sinking of the ship.

Survey
Soon, though, the S.S. Milwaukee will be more accessible, not just to divers but to those who won't need a tank of compressed air to see the shipwreck.

Starting next summer archaeologists will survey and document the S.S. Milwaukee and four other Lake Michigan shipwrecks in Wisconsin waters through a federal grant awarded this month to the Wisconsin Historical Society. Chosen because they represent a cross section of historically significant vessels, the shipwrecks are near Milwaukee, Manitowoc, Kewaunee and Sturgeon Bay.

"Part of what we were looking for were five shipwrecks that are already popular with people," said Jim Draeger, deputy state historic preservation officer. "They're all ones that are pretty intact and have good archaeological potential."

The $170,000 grant from the Federal Highway Administration Transportation Enhancement program will pay for digital photo mosaics, sketches and measurements, photos, site plans and historic research. Digital photo mosaics illustrate the wreck as it now looks by piecing together hundreds of photos taken by scuba divers. Divers will measure and sketch the wreck, said Draeger.

The archaeological surveys and documentation will be used to nominate the five wrecks to the National Register of Historic Places, which will give them additional legal protection. Buoys will be placed at each site so dive boats can safely moor without harming the shipwreck.

Along with the S.S. Milwaukee, these ships will be surveyed:

• EMBA, an early self-loading vessel scuttled in 1932 about six miles northeast of Milwaukee's main harbor;

• Floretta, an iron ore schooner wrecked off Manitowoc in 1885;

• America, a three-masted freight boat that sank near Kewaunee in 1880;

• Lakeland, an iron steamer loaded with new autos lost off Sturgeon Bay in 1924.

Jerry Guyer has dived on the S.S. Milwaukee for years. He takes many customers to the wreck through his work as owner of Pirate's Cove Dive Shop in Milwaukee and captain of the Lender scuba charter boat. Among the popular sights are the wheel house, which lies on the lake bottom near the wreck, as well as the twisted storm gate that many believe led to the demise of the Milwaukee. Some have speculated that the rail cars broke free and crashed against the gate, allowing water to flow in.

While the S.S. Milwaukee used to be a challenging dive for those who wanted to penetrate the wreck and swim inside to see the rail cars and cargo, it's now very difficult because the ship is starting to break apart. Until a few years ago divers could see two intact 1920s automobiles, but now the vehicles have been reduced to piles of car parts.

"It was fairly intact until the last 10 years. It's been breaking apart. The decks and bilges have all collapsed. It's not what it once was," said Guyer. "Because of its depth, it's a shorter dive than some of the other (wrecks.) Its size makes it pretty hard to see on any one dive, so a lot of people ask to go back and make several dives."

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Wisconsin Historical Society | Divers examine what remains of one of the automobiles the S.S. Milwaukee was transporting when it sank in heavy Lake Michigan seas. -