How ‘The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald’ Defied Top 40 Logic

Gordon Lightfoot, the Canadian folks singer who died on Monday at 84, had one hit specifically that famously defied Top 40 logic.

“The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” his 1976 folks ballad, was uncommon partly as a result of, at greater than six minutes lengthy, it was about twice so long as most pop hits. It additionally retold a real-life tragedy — the 1975 sinking on Lake Superior of a freighter with 29 crewmen aboard — with meticulous consideration to element.

“It’s a documentarian’s song, when you think about it,” stated Eric Greenberg, a longtime buddy of the singer who interviewed Mr. Lightfoot as a pupil journalist within the late Seventies and later co-wrote a track with him.

The plotline of a typical Top 40 hit often consists of “boy meets girl, boy breaks up with girl, or come back, or you left me, or whatever,” Mr. Greenberg stated, talking by cellphone from New York City. “Not a five-, six-, seven-minute story — a factual story, in Gordon’s case, painstakingly checked to make sure that all the facts are right.”

Here’s the true story that impressed “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” and a have a look at the track that stored its reminiscence alive.

A disappearing ship

The Edmund Fitzgerald was a 729-foot ore provider and one of many largest freighters on the Great Lakes when it left Superior, Wis., on Nov. 9, 1975, carrying iron pellets certain for Detroit.

The subsequent day, the ship was caught in a storm with winds that averaged 60 to 65 miles an hour. Its captain reported 20- to 25-foot waves washing over the decks and water pouring in beneath deck by two damaged air vents.

That night time, the Edmund Fitzgerald sank close to the coasts of Ontario and Michigan, in water that was solely about 50 levels. A close-by ship reported seeing its lights disappear within the driving snow.

The Coast Guard later discovered lifeboats, life rings and different particles from the ship. But the lifeboats have been self-inflatable, so their discovery didn’t essentially point out that they’d been used. None of the 29 crew members survived.

An unlikely success

The morning after the Fitzgerald went down, the rector of Mariners’ Church of Detroit tolled its bell 29 occasions, as soon as for every man misplaced. An Associated Press reporter knocked on the church’s door, interviewed the rector and filed an account that was revealed in newspapers.

Mr. Lightfoot learn the article. Soon afterward, he began singing a track concerning the wreck throughout a beforehand scheduled recording session. His band joined in, and the primary model of the track that they recorded was later launched, in response to “Gordon Lightfoot: If You Could Read My Mind,” a 2020 documentary.

There was no expectation that the track would turn into successful single, as a result of its size made it too lengthy for airplay on the radio. But it will spend 21 weeks on the Billboard charts and peak at No. 2, one notch behind Mr. Lightfoot’s solely No. 1 hit, “Sundown.” It additionally turned the story of the sinking into a contemporary legend.

Yet in contrast to songs that use a real-life story as the premise for embellishment, Mr. Lightfoot’s ballad hewed exactly to the real-life particulars. The weight of the ore, for instance — “26,000 tons more than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty” — was correct. So was the variety of occasions that the church bell chimed in Detroit.

Decades later, Mr. Lightfoot modified the lyrics barely after investigations into the accident revealed that waves, not crew error, had led to the shipwreck. In the brand new lyrics, he sang that it received darkish at 7 that November night time on Lake Superior — not {that a} major hatchway caved in.

“That’s the kind of meticulous, looking-for-the-truth kind of guy that he was,” Mr. Greenberg stated.

An enduring legacy

“The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” like its creator, endured as a Canadian traditional lengthy after slipping off the Top 40 charts. The bluegrass guitarist Tony Rice (who additionally launched a complete album of Lightfoot cowl songs) and the rock bands Rheostatics and the Dandy Warhols have been amongst those that sang covers over time.

“The melodies are so powerful and he’s such a good storyteller and such a beautiful lyricist,” the Canadian singer-songwriter Sarah McLachlan stated within the 2020 documentary. “And the combination of those things just really makes for a great song.”

Mr. Lightfoot remained pleased with it for many years, and he stored newspaper clippings and objects given to him by the crew members’ surviving households in his house, Mr. Greenberg stated.

The track’s success had one draw back: It turned the wreck, which lies in Canadian territory at a depth of about 500 toes, right into a trophy for divers, upsetting the misplaced sailors’ households. In 2006, the federal government of Ontario adopted a legislation defending the location.