Home For Christmas
(13x9 in.) $45.00, original available (23x17 in.) $900.00

It is dawn, as huge snowflakes begin to fall through the crisp, -10 below zero air on Christmas Eve 1996 and the 1004’ long M/V Edwin H. Gott of the Great Lakes Fleet is passing under the Aerial Lift Bridge in it's home port of Duluth, MN. Evidence of a ferocious battle with the 10’-15’ waves encountered in crossing Lake Superior are clearly visible in the 2’-3’ ice accumulations on forward areas of the hull. The Gott’s 2 V-16 cylinder 19,500 horsepower engines, largest on the Great Lakes, are powering up and pushing out huge clouds of diesel exhaust as it prepares to enter an ice field of 6"-8” and even thicker 10"-12" of ice near the CN/DM&IR (Canadian National/Duluth, Missabe & Iron Range Railway) Docks. Much of the crew of 25 will be able to be with family for the holiday but as soon as the vessel completes loading taconite by mid-afternoon on Christmas Day, the Gott will be downbound to Conneaut, OH where the cargo will be unloaded and railed to a steel mill in Pittsburgh, PA.