Robert C. Pringle 1922
Marker: recorded wreck position (Interwar).
Key facts
| Name | Robert C. Pringle | Wikidata label |
|---|---|---|
| Year lost | 1922 | English Wikipedia lead text (year following a loss verb, parsed) |
| Era | Interwar | derived from year |
| Ship type | tug | Wikidata P31 instance of |
| Nearest coast | United States | Natural Earth (public domain) |
| Position | 43.6917, -87.5550 | Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0) |
About the wreck
Robert C. Pringle, originally named Chequamegon, was a wooden-hulled American tugboat. She sank without loss of life on Lake Michigan, near Sheboygan, Wisconsin, on June 19, 1922, after striking an obstruction, possibly floating driftwood.
Chequamegon was built in 1903 in Manitowoc, Wisconsin, by the Manitowoc Shipbuilding & Dry Dock Company. She was built for the newly formed Chequamegon Bay Transportation Company of Ashland, Wisconsin, under which she hauled freight between Ashland, Bayfield, Washburn and Madeline Island. She was sold multiple times between 1904 and 1918, and was renamed Pere Marquette 7 in 1911. In 1918, she was sold to the Pringle Barge Line, who converted her to a tug and renamed her Robert C. Pringle.
On June 18, 1922, Robert C. Pringle began towing the wooden bulk freighter Venezuela from Milwaukee to Sandusky, Ohio, where the Venezuela was scheduled to receive extensive repairs. At about 2:00 a.m. on the following day, as the vessels were passing Sheboygan, Robert C. Pringle struck an obstruction, and began taking on water rapidly.
Diving & visiting
Robert C. Pringle's wreck was discovered in 300 feet (91.4 m) of water by Steve Radovan in 2008. Radovan had been searching for her since the 1970s, locating the wrecks of the schooners Floretta and Home in the process. Her wreck is upright and was described by the Wisconsin Historical Society as "remarkably intact on a sand and silt covered lake bottom, with little damage or deterioration". Her pilothouse, including the glass in four of its windows, remains in place. The captain's cabin, located behind the pilothouse is also intact. Robert C. Pringle's triple expansion engine still retains gold lettering.
Location
- Recorded position: 43.6917, -87.5550 (Wikidata P625 coordinate location (CC0); may be approximate)
- Nearest coast: United States
Wreck positions on this site are for interest only and are not for navigation. Many wrecks are war graves or legally protected: never disturb human remains or remove artefacts, and check local law before diving.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Robert C. Pringle (revision 1370040170), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section and section(s) “Wreck”; condensed by selecting paragraphs and trimming at sentence boundaries; citations and formatting removed. No text added. This excerpt is available under the same licence.
Wreck facts from Wikidata (CC0).
Nearby wrecks
- Hetty Taylor shipwreck 1880 · 8 km
- SS Selah Chamberlain 1886 · 12 km
- Gallinipper 14 km
- Byron shipwreck 1867 · 14 km
- SS Pere Marquette 18 1910 · 21 km
- SS Atlanta 23 km
Browse more: North America wrecks · wrecks off United States · Interwar