One man’s fight with Michigan over quest for the oldest Great Lakes shipwreck
livemint.comSUMMER ISLAND, Mich.—Steve Libert steered his finicky pontoon boat and aging crew of scuba divers to a spot offshore this uninhabited island in northern Lake Michigan, lined up with a dead cedar tree and dropped anchor. Eight feet beneath the clear, green water sat the skeletal wreck of the first full-size European ship to sail—and sink—in the Upper Great Lakes, in 1679: French explorer Robert La Salle’s Le Griffon. Or maybe not.
Every adventurous spirit has their own white whale. Libert, 70 years old and retired from a career in naval intelligence, has been diving these waters in search of the Griffon for 43 years. Yet he is nearly alone in his belief that he has finally located the fabled wreck, thanks in part to the failure of a highly publicized 2013 excavation of a different spot he thought would finally reveal the ship, and a prickly, litigious relationship with Michigan officials.
“The ‘Griffon’ has not been found," said Wayne R. Lusardi, maritime archaeologist for the Michigan Department of Natural Resources. Asked to elaborate on his conclusion, he responded: “I’m sorry, I am very busy documenting real sites and don’t have time for fantasy." “They don’t look at the evidence," Libert countered.
“They think I’m this shady character." Still, Libert has a trusted crew who believe in his quest, including Tom Kucharsky, a 68-year-old machinist from Dayton, Ohio. “If Steve asks me to do something, I’m gonna try like hell to do it," he said. “He’s my treasure." Libert is rowing against the tide.
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