On this day March 30, 1893, the steamer VEGA was launched without a hitch by the Globe Iron Works Company at Cleveland with an audience of over 400.  Built for the Vega Steamship Company of Lorain, Ohio, she was the sister ship of the steamer VULCAN built in 1889.

Photo above: UGANDA left, VEGA right in the 1890s

            The VEGA measured 301.2 feet in length, 38.5 feet in beam and 21.1 feet in depth.  She was valued at $167,000, had two spars and a steam capstan.  She was commanded by Capt. Frank Brown and her chief engineer was Charles Sterling, both of whom sailed on the VULCAN in 1892.

VEGA

            The VEGA sailed for the Vega Steamship Company through 1902 and then for Gilchrist Transportation Company.

            On November 28, 1905, she stranded on Fox Island at the foot of Lake Michigan.   Down bound from Escanaba to Chicago with a load of iron ore, she ran into a severe snowstorm and landed on Fox Island.  Soon afterward she broke in two with her fore and after parts being separated by more than twenty feet.  Her crew of nineteen men were safely rescued from the wreck by local fishermen and taken to Northport, Mich.

Suzette Lopez

Photo Credit:  Great Lakes Marine Collection of the Milwaukee Public Library and Wisconsin Marine Historical Society.