For some reason, I have always been fascinated by the stories of shipwrecks in Door County. I remember as a kid trying to find one with my dad and uncle out from Sunset Park in Sturgeon Bay and later snorkeling on it when I was in high school using an old GPS. I found my first time snorkeling on a shipwreck both terrifying and thrilling. Since then, I have found snorkeling and free diving over these wrecks to be a fun and eerie experience. Some of them are fairly small and broken up but some span well over a hundred feet. I’m no diver but there are loads of wrecks in Door County you can see with just a mask and snorkel. I didn’t think years later I would be finding undiscovered wrecks around the peninsula but with over 200 shipwrecks around Door County it turns out not all of them have been accounted for. One of these wrecks I found turned out to be the Frank D. Barker.
I have known about this wreck for several years and periodically would look for it on satellite images since it was suppose to have wrecked right off of Spider Island in Rowley’s Bay and close to Newport State Park. Every time I’d look I would come up empty handed. Nothing appeared to be in shallow water in the area. Last summer a new batch of satellite images came up online that were clearer and crisper then anything else that had been uploaded previously so I started scanning the area again. I faintly found an outline of a wreck in probably 20-25 feet of water over four miles away from Spider Island near an unspecified shoal. I went out to the wreckage on our boat and jumped in to check it out. What I found was well over 130 feet long and broken up in large sections. After reporting the wreck to Tamara Thomsen and the Wisconsin Historical Society they informed me it was most likely the Frank D. Barker.
The Frank D. Barker was originally a 137 foot wood schooner that was on it’s way to Escanaba, MI from Manistee, MI when it ran aground on Spider Island in “thick weather” on October 3, 1887. Several attempts were made to free the stranded ship but ultimately it was left on the island during the winter. Over the course of that winter “mountain high” waves broke the ship apart and it was lost. All accounts said the Barker was on Spider Island but there must have been a mistake of where it’s actual location was. Because of the misidentified location of it’s stranding, this wreck evaded shipwreck hunters for well over a century.
It was pretty amazing to be the first person to see the Frank Barker in over 100 years. When I finally had the chance to see it I made sure to bring my family out for the excursion. My wife, Rachel, and 6 year old son Magnus also jumped in to check it out too. It was his first shipwreck snorkel experience. Even though the wreck is over 20 feet deep, the water on the lakeside is incredibly clear when the conditions are right and it is great for viewing shipwrecks. Today the wreck lies over a mile from shore right next to a shoal that is only 6 feet deep. It is pretty clear the Barker hit this shoal before sinking in 20 feet of water. There’s a lot to see at this wreck site because it is so deep. There is the bottom of the hull intact and the sides appeared to have split open and lie on both sides of the bottom of the hull. There is also a windlass still visible which is something you normally don’t see in shallow water wrecks. This is a sign the captain and crew were unable to remove everything before the boat finally sank. There are also suppose to be 2 anchors below the surface but I haven’t seen them yet.
