Lake Erie Lives
On hot, still afternoons, Lake Erie hides its secrets well. The surface glides toward the horizon like slowly unrolling wrapping paper. The water temperature inches up to 80 degrees. Intrigue, war and shipwrecked souls feel a million miles and a hundred years away — unless you’re inside the head of Chad Fraser.
As a small boy growing up within biking distance of the shore, first in the resort town of Leamington, Ontario, then in nearby Tillsonburg and Kingsville, Lake Erie seeped into Fraser’s veins. “I grew up outside,” says the 35-year-old. “I was always kind of within a stone’s throw of the water.”
Fraser’s father bought his 30-foot speed boat through a government auction and, upon discovering its history as a smuggling boat, named it The Fugitive. A short ride on this boat brought Fraser to Pelee Island and his grandparents’ cottage, where tales of Lake Erie’s wrath were common fare around the campfire.
His great-uncle, still a commercial fisherman, joined his grandfather and other island locals in conjuring the mythical history of the lake — romantic stories such as the legend of Huldah, an Indian maiden who so despaired over the loss of her British lover that she jumped to her death off what’s now known as Huldah’s Rock.
Such thrilling tales quickly winnowed their way into the brain of a kid who already loved boats and reading. “That’s what got me going,” Fraser says. For years, he harbored a droplet of an idea: a book about Pelee and its history. But as he grew into a writer and editor for various publishing houses, the story of Pelee began to morph into the history of the lake that surrounds it.
He dove into research, spending four years traversing the lake, digging through files and mining the records at historical societies on every shore. His book, Lake Erie Stories, rings with paradox and tension.
Consider, for example, that the lake boasts an average depth of just 62 feet and anchors the southernmost reaches of Canada’s vast territory, but those traits are both blessing and curse. Warm waters and stifling hot days can turn vicious quickly. “Lake Erie is the most volatile of the Great Lakes,” says Fraser. “When it blows up, it can cause a lot of damage, and it can be pretty fearsome.” The storms have been so fabulous they’ve even gotten their own names: There’s 1916’s Black Friday, and the Great Storm of 1913.
High-powered winds and rolling conditions underneath the waves are able editors of Lake Erie’s shoreline, shifting and creating dangerous sandbars and shoals at will. Cleveland is home to the Lake Erie Monsters, but for hundreds of years, Lake Erie has been the monster, ready to brawl when thunder brews.
Right now, out there in the lake, lie the ghosts of men and ships, casualties of storm and war. Villains, rumrunners and knaves, heroes and pioneers, they all had their moment on Lake Erie.
Fraser tells the sorry story of the French adventurer René-Robert, shot in the face with a musket by for being so insufferable. He illuminates the horror of the Battle of Lake Erie, which left 68 soldiers dead.
Separated from the lake by his publishing job in Toronto, Fraser has begun to spend more time on Lake Ontario and had contemplated starting a series of Great Lakes book.
But the book is a bit frozen, as he puts it. His connection to Lake Erie is so deeply personal, he’s struggling to make room for a new set of tales. Fraser loves the mystery and adventure of the old Lake Erie legends. Perhaps that’s why he loves the lake at its calmest and most innocent, when the stories seem nothing short of fantastical, and the most visceral image of Lake Erie is nothing more alarming than a shiny, plate-glass surface and a few beads of sweat.
Lake Erie Stories: Struggle and Survival on a Freshwater Ocean is available on amazon.com.