Just to reiterate what I mentioned on the Pasty Cam lead-in page today, the early October snow has been pretty here in the Copper Country, but enough is enough, we need a warm-up for at least another three weeks or maybe a month, even. Just look at Bob Gilreath’s flowers, who were just minding their own business, still colorful and bright, when BAM, the snow came and weighed heavy on their pretty heads.

I’m crossing my fingers and toes, hoping that the temperatures warm up again for a few weeks, so folks can finish getting their winter wood in the basement, their boats winterized and their snowmobiles ready for when winter comes and stays. Lawn decorations need putting away, maybe even one more mowing of the grass. Plenty of fall chores to get done, so we need a bit of fall to do them.

A heads up here, that even though the color season is over here in the Keweenaw, there is still a plethora of beautiful fall photos and I plan on extending fall in the Copper Country in the next week or two with them, here on the Pasty Cam. Hope you’re all OK with that.

Bob made a peaceful video of the snow falling, to go along with his white-capped flower photos. Enjoy!

There certainly is something special about these early snowfalls while decent splashes of color still exist. It's the wonderful contrast that jumps out between the wonder of Autumn and the hint of Winter gloom that is about to happen.

If I might, I'd like to share a couple more examples. These were taken in October, 2018 at Old Victoria.

And a second one, also from Old Victoria, October 2018:

I love the cabin picture. It's Very frigid
here in Minnesota. I'm not liking it. I'm
hoping it's warmer on Halloween.

Apologies for changing the topic but I just finished watching a fascinating National Geographic Channel show called "Ghost Ships of the Great Lakes." It focused on the sinking of 3 ships. Two were 300 foot wooden steamer sister ships, the "S.S. L.R. Doty" and the "S.S. Iosco" and the 3rd was a schooner barge "Olive Jeanette".

The L.R. Doty sank on this date October 25 in 1898 offshore from Milwaukee but was only discovered in 2010 due to investigative persistence that found a newspaper article of an interview with the female cook, Frankie Waters (aka Frances Browne), on the schooner barge Olive Jeanette. The Olive Jeanette was being towed at the time by the L.R. Doty. The Olive Jeanette survived the storm along with its female cook. It was very unusual at the time for a woman to serve in on Lakers. As a result, the Olive Jeanette gained a bit of a bewitched reputation.

Eight years later in 1905 the Iosco (sister ship to the L.R. Doty) was towing the same Olive Jeanette both full of iron ore and both sank close to the Huron Islands. The foundering of the schooner was witnessed by the Huron lighthouse keeper. The video documents the scuba diving on the wreckage found 300 feet deep off Point Abbaye. The video also attempts to tie the discovery of a female skull to the wreckage as the same cook. The skull had been snagged years earlier in the net of a local, unnamed fisherman. Supposedly, the fisherman's old nautical charts aided in the discovery of the wreck. He had marked it to avoid future snagging.

National Geographic Video
Apologies for poor quality. I don't know when it will be shown again on cable TV. DVD is available on Amazon.

S.S. L.R. Doty

S.S. Iosco

Olive Jeanette

Thanks, D.A. I love watching those films.
The Maritime Museum in Duluth shows such good
films and has such great stories on some of
these ships. Next time we're there, I'll be
sure to see if there's anything on these.