Century-old shipwreck discovered in Lake Michigan by a 25-year-old angler

The J.C. Ames in 1881, 144 years later, it was discovered in Lake Michigan by Christopher Thuss. Credit: C. Patrick Labadie Collection 

By Isabella Figueroa Nogueira 

It was another foggy day of fishing on the Wisconsin waters of Lake Michigan.  

As 25-year-old Christopher Thuss was scanning the waters for bass, something unexpected appeared on his sonar: an unknown object beneath the surface. 

What he had discovered was no ordinary catch, but a 102-year-old shipwreck, the J.C. Ames.

“I came across a couple pieces of wood on my electronics on the boat. Then I turned over that way and came across the wreck,” said Thuss, a Two Rivers, Wisconsin, resident.

By comparing his location with records of known shipwrecks in the area, he found no match for the wreck he had discovered.

Then he turned to his grandmother, nicknamed “Shipwreck Suzze” because she had discovered six shipwrecks in the area. 

Grandma Suzanne Johnson of Two Rivers connected him with Tamara Thomsen, a maritime archaeologist with the Wisconsin Historical Society, whom he contacted through Facebook Messenger.

“Christopher sent me a message and said, ‘Hey, I think I found a shipwreck.’”

“He sent me the location and a snapshot from his cell phone of what his bottom sounder was showing, and I mashed it up against our database, and there was nothing that had been in that area before. We knew it was a new find,” said Thomsen.

Tim Pranke, a volunteer diver for the Wisconsin Historical Society, looked at the J.C Ames for the first time since it sank in 1923. By WHS, Maritime Preservation and Archeology Program. 

Thomsen set off a few days later to Manitowoc, Wisconsin, and got the first look at the wreck with two volunteers. Thomsen and the volunteers set off into the water, got a good look at the ship and measured it as around 160 feet long.

The J.C. Ames did not originally show up in their database, so Thomsen asked a volunteer to do his own research.

“He came up with a few more, and the only one that fits is this J.C. Ames,” said Thomsen.

Once they figured out what the boat was, Thomsen started doing research about it and what it was used for.

The boat was built in 1881 in Manitowoc and used to tow schooners and barges filled with lumber.

The J.C. Ames did that until 1885, when it was used by the Lake Michigan Car Ferry Transportation Co. to move barges of rail cars between Chicago and Peshtigo. Then a year later, it was used in the pulp trade.

“It has sort of this varied career, but all involved with lumber-to-lumber products, and that’s very important to Wisconsin maritime history,” said Thomsen.

Given its historical significance and years of service, locating the J.C. Ames was a major moment in regional maritime archaeology, and it came with excitement, said Thomsen.

“I read about shipwrecks for much of my life. It was just a matter finding one myself that was pretty shocking,” said Thuss.

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