ONLINE: Wreck of the S.S. Senator

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On Halloween day 1929—the same week as the Black Tuesday stock market crash-- the 4048-ton steel carrier Senator was steaming in dense fog off Port Washington, Wisconsin, when it collided with the freighter Marquette. The Senator split nearly in two and sank in over 450 feet of water, along with the 268 Nash automobiles it was carrying from Milwaukee to Detroit. The deckload of cars ended up in the sand aft of the vessel’s stern, but the cars within the ship’s hull remain in near pristine condition, still lashed in place. Partnering with Crossmon Consulting and Marine Imagining Technologies, in 2015 and again in 2017, the Wisconsin Historical Society used state-of-the-art remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) capable of operating in deep waters to capture the first-ever clear images of the S.S. Senator. Information gathered during the survey of the wreck has resulted in listing the S.S. Senator on the National Register of Historic Places.