Low water levels have many ramifications.

Beaches may turn from mostly sand to weeds and boaters may be adversely impacted. Commercial vessels may have their drafts restricted, and harbors may require extra dredging.
Northern Lower Michigan has suffered from severe drought this summer, and the northern half of the Upper Peninsula has had drought classified as “extreme.” An example as relayed in the Sept. 2 edition of the Mining Journal in Marquette.

The Laughing Whitefish River in Alger County, “typically a swiftly moving trout and salmon spawning riffle,” was reported on the last day of August as being “nothing but strewn boulders, cobbles and pebbles” by the newspaper. “The river, in several locations is dried up, posing significant trouble for Lake Superior fish expecting to reach spawning areas this fall.”

And less water in Lake Superior means less water for lakes Huron and Michigan.

At times, Lake Michigan communities have fought Chicago on the issue of water levels. Historically, the major user of Lake Michigan water has been the Windy City. Chicago, which was founded in 1830, grew to such an extent that the handling of sewage became an issue, since the city drew its drinking water from the lake.

Accordingly, the Chicago River, which originally emptied into the lake, was made to flow backwards, into the Chicago Sanitary Canal, and ultimately down the Mississippi and into the Gulf of Mexico.

After 1900, water diversion became an issue. In the 1930s, it was plainly a hot issue, with various municipalities, as well as the state of Michigan, aligned against Chicago. The Enterprise carried news from Lansing of the diversion court fights with the Windy City in the decade.

The Supreme Court’s first ruling against Chicago came down early in 1925 and the court later decreed that diversion should be limited to 1,500 cubic feet per second by 1938. The issue was eclipsed by World War II, but was again in the forefront in the 1950s.

Meanwhile, the existence of the “Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal” had its own impact on Lake Michigan and the other Great Lakes, as well as Leelanau County.

During the war, 26 submarines were built at Manitowoc, Wis., and were taken to saltwater via the canal. After 1950 a number of saltwater vessels were brought into the lakes via the canal, to augment the commercial fleet, which was otherwise comprised of predominately lake-built vessels.

One such ship was the bulk carrier Middletown, built during World War II as a tanker. As a bulk carrier, it unloaded, on at least one occasion, a cargo of coal at Greilickville. It is the only freighter on the Great Lakes that can lay claim to downing an enemy aircraft (in the Pacific).

Another vessel brought into the lakes via the canal was the destroyer Daniel A. Joy, which served as “flagship” of the “Cornbelt Fleet.” It was a familiar visitor to Leelanau County waters in the 1950s, when it and smaller Naval vessels conducted maneuvers around the Manitou Islands in the summer months while training reservists.

On April 30, 1953, the Enterprise reported that the destroyer, the “flagship of a seven-unit Naval fleet again on maneuvers this summer near South Manitou Island,” had anchored off Leland “to send ashore a sailor from Trenton, Ohio, who had received notice of a death in his family.”

Other vessels brought into the Great Lakes via the canal included the Elton Hoyt II, which searched for survivors of the Carl D. Bradley, which sank in northern Lake Michigan near Gull Island (not Leelanau’s, otherwise known as Bellow’s Island) in November 1958.

Major obstacles for ships being brought into the Great Lakes via Chicago were limited depths and bridge clearances, but the difficulties could be addressed for the “one-way voyages.”

With the completion of the St. Lawrence Seaway in 1959, the need to bring ships up the sanitary/ship canal was eliminated. But a few ships continued to use the once-busy Chicago River.

One such ship, which has had a number of adverse encounters with drawbridges over the river, was the cement carrier St. Marys Challenger, out of Charlevoix. Bridges would be opened and then become “stuck.” Some thought the ship was a “jinx.”

This same vessel, the oldest operating commercial ship on the Great Lakes, has often been seen in Leelanau waters, sheltering from stormy weather.

It sometimes anchors behind Sleeping Bear Point and is a familiar visitor to Suttons Bay. It’s the captain’s decision whether to proceed or wait for conditions deemed safe for travel.

Prudent decisions by numerous captains, down through the years, have helped keep the ship afloat for decades.

The St. Mary’s Challenger is now 101 years old – only a few years younger than the ship canal it has occasionally visited.

The same ship canal that continues to draw off precious water from the Great Lakes.