'The Gales of November' excerpt: Edmund Fitzgerald built for luxury, not safety

[RandySF]

The Edmund Fitzgerald fulfilled all the aspirations its creators hoped it would achieve, and more: Beyond being the biggest and the best, its many admirers deemed it the most luxurious freighter on the Great Lakes. To outfit the Fitzgerald, Northwestern Mutual hired Detroit’s legendary downtown department store, J. L. Hudson, and told the retailer to spare no expense.

The captain’s pilothouse featured top-end navigational equipment and a chart room—normally a no-nonsense space devoted solely to storing and viewing charts—with exquisite trim and spectacular views. In 1958 carpeting and air-conditioning were considered luxuries in homes and cars, and virtually unheard of in factories. Likewise, televisions were still sufficiently rare that motels that had them saw fit to brag about this feature on roadside signs. The Fitz was ahead of them all, with carpeting, air-conditioning and TVs throughout the living quarters.

The captain’s quarters had its own bath, toilet, adjoining office, and a large living room and bedroom. The rest of the officers were given their own private rooms, and the designers treated the crew, too, with two spacious recreation rooms, one at the bow and the other in the stern, with televisions, libraries, and writing desks. At every level in the chain of command, from the captain to the deckhands, the engineers to the oilers, each crew member could be certain that no one at their rank had better accommodations on the Great Lakes.

The purpose of all this was not to indulge employees, but to attract the very best crewmen at every position.





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