Bringing Past to Surface: Divers Picking Over Remains of Fire Boat No. 23

By Meg Jones, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Aug. 27–Perhaps it was fitting that a boat responsible for pumping millions of gallons of water to douse burning buildings and ships as well as saving uncounted lives would end its life in water.

Outliving its usefulness, Milwaukee Fire Boat No. 23 was unceremoniously stripped of its hoses and steam pumping equipment and scuttled in Lake Michigan.

Though the July 27, 1923, sinking was not a secret, the actual location of the shipwreck was lost for more than eight decades until Milwaukee wreck hunter Jerry Guyer discovered its dilapidated, zebra mussel-encrusted carcass in 2005.

The years haven’t been kind to the 101-foot-long vessel, but since it’s a wreck important to Milwaukee’s history, a group of volunteers from the Wisconsin Underwater Archeology Association and Great Lakes Shipwreck Research Foundation is documenting what is believed to be Milwaukee Fire Boat No. 23.

The gleaming tugboat that slid down a Sturgeon Bay shipyard in 1896 at a cost of $32,800 now looks like a partially pulled apart set of Lincoln Logs with a huge steam boiler sticking up in the middle.

Volunteer scuba divers are taking measurements and shooting photos and video to try to figure out the identity of some of the equipment that now rests in 70 feet of water, three miles east of the harbor.

Named after the station that operated it, No. 23 was Milwaukee’s third fire boat and patrolled the rivers and harbor at a time when the city looked far different than it does today.

Warehouses, grain elevators, lumberyards and tanneries that crowded the waterfront often ignited.

It was up to the fire boat crews to extinguish them, using large steam boilers to draw water from the rivers and lake and shooting it from large brass water cannons.

“When those would go up — at that time the fire department had horse-drawn steam engines and they couldn’t get everywhere — the fire boats were the only way to tackle these fires,” said Capt. Jim Ley, Milwaukee Fire Department historian, noting that it was common for fire boats to handle 150 fires a year.

During the early part of the 20th century, Milwaukee had more firefighting boats than any inland city in the country, even more than Chicago, said Ley. At the time, there were many more ships and boats plying the Great Lakes than there are today and often those caught fire, too.

Fire Boat No. 23 was originally named after Assistant Fire Chief August F. Janssen, who was killed in 1896 along with eight other firefighters when the roof of the Davidson Theater collapsed during a fire. It was renamed in 1901.

The No. 23 was almost identical — only one foot longer — to Fire Boat No. 17, which was scuttled in 1930 but sunk with more equipment left on it.

It’s the history

Both fire boats have been high on the list of shipwrecks Guyer has searched for in the last 20 years.

“It’s the history, it was the fact that it was a city-owned boat, and Milwaukee has a rich history of fire boats,” Guyer said.

The fire boat was found by accident.

While pulling a side-scanning sonar like a lawn mower behind his boat in January 2005, Guyer saw the unmistakable figure of a boat.

At first he thought it was one of the many garbage barges that were sunk years before environmental protections prevented dumping in Lake Michigan.

When he put on air tanks and swam down for a closer look, though, he realized it had to be one of Milwaukee’s fire boats.

“I knew right away when I saw the base of the water pumps. No other ships have those,” said Guyer.

Which Milwaukee Fire Boat — No. 23 or No. 17 — was the question.

There’s no sign on the ship that says it’s No. 23 and the remains of Milwaukee Fire Boat No. 17 are also off Milwaukee’s coast somewhere. But historians and divers are fairly certain it’s No. 23 because even though both tugs were roughly the same size with the same boilers made by the same manufacturer, No. 17 was scuttled with more equipment still on it. Guyer is still looking for No. 17.

“We concluded it was the No. 23 based upon what was left on her. There was some description in the historical record of what was left on her when she was stripped,” said Brendon Baillod, a Great Lakes maritime historian. “We don’t see any of the original firefighting equipment on her.”

Want detailed drawing

On a recent Thursday evening, four volunteer divers from the Wisconsin Underwater Archeology Association rode Guyer’s dive boat out to the site and splashed into the cold water armed with mesh bags filled with tape measures and clipboards.

While Kimm Stabelfeldt roamed the wreck with a video camera, Marshall Lokken, Bob Lijewski and Peter Kastella concentrated on a specific part of the splayed-open vessel in the 20 minutes of allotted bottom time in the 48-degree water.

The aim is to eventually produce a detailed drawing of the shipwreck that will be made into a waterproof slate that can be carried to the site by divers interested in seeing a sunken piece of Milwaukee’s firefighting history.

As Lokken measured parts of the boiler, Lijewski and Kastella used their tape measures and clipboards to document a 16-foot-long by 3-foot-wide wooden section near the starboard bow that looked like a panel that may have come from inside the boat. Nearby, the large propeller loomed up from the sand like a giant rotating fan.

“We really don’t know what it is so we’re trying to get dimensions and sketch it out,” said Kastella, who was making his third dive to the fire boat. “I like to figure out how ships are built. If you know what parts you’re looking at, you can picture what it looked like.”

It was also Lijewski’s third visit to the wreck site. A diver for 36 years, Lijewski has volunteered for shipwreck research projects in Door County.

“I like shipwrecks and going someplace that not many people go. The fire boat has a history to it — it seems like you’re going back in time when you dive on it,” said Lijewski.

Research from this summer’s expedition to Milwaukee Fire Boat No. 23 will be presented by Brendon Baillod at a Wisconsin Underwater Archeology Association conference Oct. 20 as well as the Ghost Ships Festival, March 7 and 8, 2008. Both events will be held at the Four Points Sheraton Hotel in Milwaukee and will be open to the public.

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