A Piece of History Washes Ashore

"On a [late fall] day when the sea was rippled
By a soft and gentle breeze
A ship set sail for a harbor laden
To a port beyond the seas.
There were fond farewells and loving signals
While her form was yet discerned,
But they knew not 'twas a solemn parting,
For the ship has never returned.

--"The Ship that Never Returned"--Henry Clay Work

Although Barry Bonds is All Over the News with his home-run record, (and all of the controversy surrounding....) I found this article much more interesting. Maybe you are too young to remember this (it happened in 1975), but I remember my horror that this kind of thing still happened. I understand why sailors have a great respect for the sea:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1877970/posts

Gordon Lightfoot memorialized this event in song:

The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they called Gitchee Gumee
Superior, it's said, never gives up her dead
When the skies of November turn gloomy
With a load of iron ore twenty-six thousand tons more
Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty.
That good ship and true was a bone to be chewed
When the gales of November came early
.....
In a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed,
In the Maritime Sailors Cathedral.
The church bell chimed till it rang twenty-nine times
For each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald.

--"The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald"--Gordon Lightfoot