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Edmund Fitzgerald Memorial Swim

Sat July 26 - Wed August 27, 2025 Paradise, MI 49768 US
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Fundraiser

Sheila Fitzgerald
In memory of my mother; for the love of the Great Lakes

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$5,764

Raised of $5,000

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$5,000

For Jean Fitzgerald and the love of the Great Lakes

In August, I’ll join a 30-mile relay with three others, swimming from the mouth of Lake Huron down the length of the St Clair River in my home state, Michigan. It’s part of a 411-mile swim relay commemorating the loss of the ship Edmund Fitzgerald and honoring the memory of her 29 crew members in Lake Superior 50 years ago.  

I’d deeply appreciate your support, whether you give money or simply your encouragement. Donations will help preserve a historic lighthouse on Lake Superior in Michigan to help keep Great Lakes mariners safe.

I’m not a fast or particularly athletic swimmer, but my mother Jean taught me to love water, especially the Great Lakes, and this event felt too personal to pass up. Through her, I’m distantly related to the Edmund Fitzgerald that the freighter was named after: our shared ancestors were an Irish couple who settled on the St Clair River in 1837 and raised six sons. They all became Great Lakes ship captains and builders — a tradition that continued for generations.

My mother’s father, also named Edmund Fitzgerald, ran a ship dry dock in Port Huron, Michigan. Our family’s connection to the freighter is a bit eerie: my first cousin Edmund Fitzgerald was born in 1958 within a week (and a few miles) of the Mighty Fitz’s launch in Detroit; the ship foundered on November 10, our grandfather Edmund's birthdate.

Jean took pride in her family’s Great Lakes connection and loved growing up beside the St Clair River and Lake Huron, and she swam in them every chance she got. As a girl in the 1930s, when her parents forbid her from swimming in the cold, fast-running river, she’d pay her little brother to push her in. The beach where she taught me to swim is just yards from where my relay will set off.

My mother would have been 100 this year, and I can’t imagine a more fitting tribute to her than swimming to commemorate the heroes of the Edmund Fitzgerald and help keep Great Lakes mariners safe. Donations will help preserve historic Whitefish Point Light Station — the most important beacon for vessels in Lake Superior — via donations to the Great Lakes Shipwreck Historical Society (US tax deductible status).

Thank you for reading. I appreciate your support truly, madly, deeply. 

Recognitions

$625
$1,250
$1,875
$2,500

Top Donors

$5,764 Raised By 67 Donors

$500 in support of Sharon Bylenga
$300 on behalf of Sarah Fortna
$250 in support of Diana Rossmiller
$250 in memory of Jack and Mary Lou Dixon
$250 on behalf of Jean, Sheila, & the Great Lakes
$200 in memory of Jean Fitzgerald, kindly donated by Chris and Mike Lysaght, who gave her so much joy.
$200 in memory of Jim & Pat Fitzgerald and Christie Smith, they would love that you are doing this Sheila and not THEM! xoxo
$200 on behalf of The Carey-Dupuis family
$130 on behalf of James Edmund Grauzer
$118 in support of Rachel Subrin Jensen
$100 on behalf of Bob Jones
$100 on behalf of Catherine FOCH
$100 from Anonymous
$100 on behalf of Ed, Colleen & Jimmy Fitzgerald
$100 on behalf of Edmund James Fitzgerald, my great-grandfather, James Edmund Fitzgerald, my grandfather and in honor of Sheila Fitzgerald!
$100 on behalf of Janet Lawson
$100 in memory of Jean and Bill
$100 in memory of Jean Fitzgerald
$100 in memory of Jean Fitzgerald, always swimming
$100 on behalf of Kelly Evans
$100 in memory of Kit Tennyson
$100 in support of L Karl Johnson
$100 in support of Leah Ann Lamb
$100 on behalf of Maureen Kilgallon
$100 on behalf of Mike Lysaght
$100 on behalf of Patrick and Mary Cogan
$100 on behalf of Sarah Jane Fenton
$100 in support of Sheila
$100 in support of Sheila! You go girl!
$100 on behalf of Sheila!!!!
$100 in support of the indomitable Sheila Fitzgerald and all those she loves.
$100 in memory of The indomitable spirit of Jean Fitzgerald
$100 on behalf of Tobin Brothers
$50 on behalf of Barbara Wagner
$50 on behalf of Beth Feresten
$50 on behalf of Chris Unknown
$50 on behalf of Drew Wilson
$50 in memory of Jean Fitzgerald
$50 in memory of Jean Fitzgerald
$50 on behalf of Jean, Sheila, and all the Fitzgeralds dear to our hearts.
$50 on behalf of Marianne Hunt
$50 in support of Mary Mullally
$50 in memory of My grandparents involvement with the Great Lakes in Canada
$50 on behalf of Nick Kaufmann
$50 on behalf of Old No.
$50 in memory of Pamela Lawson
$50 on behalf of The Tassie "blue tits" swimmers
$36 on behalf of Ronna Ness-Cohn
$30 on behalf of Thomas Grauzer
$25 in memory of Aunt Jeano
$25 on behalf of Becki Balok
$25 on behalf of Kim and Terry Cross - Mariners' Church of Detroit
$25 in support of my St. Bede buddy...
$25 On Behalf Of Sheila Fitzgerald & Aull-Dry
$20 on behalf of Ben Thompson
$20 on behalf of Margaret Thorp
$20 on behalf of Simon Thorne
$15 from Anonymous
$15 in support of Cindy Berman
$15 on behalf of Eilis Lysaght
$15 on behalf of Susanna Taggart
$10 on behalf of Anni McTavish
$10 on behalf of Elizabeth Baker
$10 on behalf of Jane Scott
$10 on behalf of Renata Moriconi
$10 in support of Sheila Fitzgerald
$5 in memory of Marge Butera

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