Copyright USGenNet Inc., 2016 All Rights Reserved USGenNet Data Repository Please read USGenNet Copyright Statement on this page: Submitted by Linda Talbott for the USGenNet Data Repository http://www.us-data.org/ ========================================================================= Formatted by USGenNet Data Repository Chief Archivist, Linda Talbott All of the above information must remain when copied or downloaded. =========================================================================== VESSEL NAME: A. J. Dewey OTHER NAME(s): - OFFICIAL NO: 105593 DATE OF LOSS: 1896 CAUSE OF LOSS: Abandoned LOCATION: Chicago RIG TYPE: Schooner HULL TYPE: Wood BUILDER: Luther Reed, Chaumont, N.Y. - 1875 OWNER(S): - MASTER: - TONNAGE: 237.45 gt DIMENSIONS: 124.7 x 25.3 x 10.8 CASUALTIES: - Abandoned on the beach near Chicago avenue, Chicago in early 1896. She was dismantled, the masts were unshipped, the decks ripped out and the hull given to the city. The third week of November, 1896, she was towed out into the inner harbor off Van Buren street and holes stove into her planks below the water line, allowing her to sink and become landfill for a park. On November 29, 1886, the A. J. DEWEY became separated from her tow, the tug A. P. WRIGHT, in a gale and headed for shelter at Manistee. The DEWEY was spotted by the life- savers at Big Point Sable station with her flag at half mast. The surfmen immediately launched the twenty-seven foot surfboat and pulled for the schooner. Before they could reach her the DEWEY hoisted her flag and continued on her way. It seems her flag had simply been stuck at half- mast. All would have been well if not for a huge wave that struck the bar and broke directly over the surfboat, rolling it over and throwing the crew into the freezing, storm lashed waters of Lake Michigan. Seven men went to the rescue but only four lived to see Christmas that year. ======================================================================== Sources: Oswego Palladium, 18 October 1875 Annual Report of the U.S.L.S.S. - Fiscal Year Ending June 30, 1888 Merchant Vessel List, 1895 Chicago Tribune, 29 November 1896 "Old Shipping Days in Oswego" - p. 208 Truman "Storms and Sand" - p. 45-59