The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they called 'Gitche Gumee'.
The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead,
When the skies of November are gloomy.
A load of iron ore twenty-six thousand tons more
The Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty,
The good ship and crew was a bone to be chewed
When the gales of November came early.
The ship was the pride of the American side,
Coming back from some mill in Wisconsin.
Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms
When she left fully loaded for Cleveland.
And later that night when the lights went out of sight,
Could it be the north wind they'd been feelin'?
At seven P.M., the old cook came on deck
saying 'Fellas, it's too rough to feed ya'.
When the captain wired in he had water comin' in,
He said 'Fellas, it's been good to know ya'
(spoken in background)
in a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed,
At the Maritime Sailors' Cathedral.
And the church bell chimes till it rings twenty-nine times
(stop spoken)
Lake Huron rolls, Superior sings
In the rooms of her ice-water mansion.
Old Michigan steams like a young man's dreams;
The islands and bays are for sportsmen.
And farther below Lake Ontario
She takes in what Lake Erie can send her,
But the iron boats go, as the mariners all know
With the Gales of November remembered.
(spoken in background)
in a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed,
At the Maritime Sailors' Cathedral.
And the church bell chimes till it rang twenty-nine times.
once for each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald.
Does any one know where the love of God goes
When the wave breaking over the railing?
Now all that remains is the faces and the names
Of the wives and the sons and the daughters.
(stop spoken)
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