A Schooner Sat Perfectly Preserved Under Green Bay for 105 Years. Bringing It Up Killed It in 25.

At the foot of Sixth Avenue on the Menominee waterfront, there is a parking lot. Thirty years ago, the strangest sight on the Great Lakes stood on that spot: an entire Civil War–era schooner, hull, deck, and masts, sitting on dry land as if the 1860s had simply forgotten to take it back. The story of how it got there is one of the great feats in Great Lakes history. The story of what happened next is one of its great heartbreaks.

The Alvin Clark was built in 1846 or 1847 at the Bates and Davis shipyard in Trenton, on the Detroit River — likely by shipbuilder John Clark, who had a son named Alvin. She was a working lake boat, nothing fancy: a 105-foot, 218-ton lumber schooner of white oak, two masts, built to haul boards. She did that for the better part of two decades. Then, in late June 1864, running empty under full sail toward Oconto, Wisconsin to pick up a load of lumber, she was knocked down by a squall off Chambers Island in Green Bay and went to the bottom, taking three of her crew with her, including Captain Francis B. Higgie of Racine.

The mystery ship from 19 fathoms

And there she sat for 105 years, upright in roughly 110 feet of cold, dark, low-oxygen water — conditions that happen to be one of the best wood-preservation systems on Earth. In November 1967, a diver named Frank Hoffmann went down to free a fisherman’s fouled net and came up having found a nearly perfect 19th-century ship. Over the next two years, Hoffmann and a crew of volunteer divers worked the wreck relentlessly, and the press fell in love with “the Mystery Ship from 19 Fathoms.” On July 29, 1969, at the Marinette Marine docks, the Alvin Clark broke the surface whole — raised, towed in, cleaned, and re-rigged, more than a century after she sank.

For a moment, it was glorious. The ship opened to the public in June 1970 at the Mystery Ship Seaport on the Menominee River, was named a Michigan historic site in 1972, and joined the National Register of Historic Places in 1974. People walked her deck and touched a ship their great-grandparents could have watched sail.

What the water kept, the air took

The warning had already been written. In February 1969, months before the lift, a wood expert put it plainly: “It would be better that the schooner remain in her watery grave.” Waterlogged oak that holds its shape for a century underwater does not survive open air; as the wood dries uncontrolled, it shrinks, checks, and tears itself apart. Saving the Alvin Clark would have taken years of careful conservation and serious money. There was no plan and no money — Hoffmann had spent himself roughly $300,000 into debt raising her, ticket sales came nowhere close, and efforts to hand the ship to an institution stalled. So the best-preserved Great Lakes vessel anyone had ever seen cracked and rotted in full public view.

The end was as sad as endings get. In 1985, Hoffmann — by every account a man watching his life’s work die in front of him — was arrested after trying to set the remains on fire. “That boat hasn’t been a blessing for Frank,” Menominee’s police chief said at the time. Hoffmann got a week in jail; in 1987 he sold the hulk to local investors for $117,000. They tried too, and failed too. Declared beyond saving and a public hazard, the Alvin Clark was bulldozed in May 1994, and the Mystery Ship Seaport was cleared to make way for the parking lot. In 2020, the National Register quietly removed her listing — the paperwork finally catching up to the bulldozer.

Here is the thing, though: the Alvin Clark did not die for nothing. She is the reason the rule on the Great Lakes today is to leave the wrecks down there — documented, protected, and visited by divers, but never lifted. Every intact schooner resting in Superior, Michigan, and Huron owes something to the one that came up. The lakes are cold, dark, patient, and very good at their job. The Alvin Clark proved it twice: once by surviving 105 years underwater, and once by lasting only 25 in the air.

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Sources, credits, and reporting details

Sources & accountability

How this story was reported

Editorial methodArchival synthesis

Last verifiedJul. 19, 2026

Corrections statusNo material correction note is recorded on this article.

Verification note: Initial ledger, verified 2026-07-19 during publication prep. Build, sinking, raising, decline and demolition dates checked against the Wisconsin Shipwrecks database, the Inland Seas reprint, and archived contemporaneous reporting. Two short quotations total: a twelve-word expert-letter fragment and an eight-word police chief remark, each attributed. Featured image public domain, credit Charles K. Hyde, used at original resolution without cropping. No AI-generated or AI-assisted media.

Primary sources

1. Alvin Clark (1846) — Wisconsin Shipwrecks (Wisconsin Historical Society and partners)

   Featured image record. Accessed Jul. 19, 2026. Public heritage database; cited.

   Supports: Frank Hoffman rediscovered the wreck in November 1967 while recovering a fisherman fouled net; volunteer divers excavated and raised the ship by 1969; national press dubbed it the Mystery Ship from 19 Fathoms; cleaned and re-rigged; opened as a tourist attraction along the Menominee River in June 1970 with a small museum.

Additional reporting

1. The Green Bay Mystery Schooner, Winter 1969 — National Museum of the Great Lakes (Inland Seas reprint)

   Featured image record. Accessed Jul. 19, 2026. Museum journal reprint; cited.

   Supports: The schooner Alvin Clark was lost in a gale off Chambers Island on June 29, 1864; three sailors were lost including Captain Francis B. Higgie of Racine, his mate and a seaman; identification of the raised wreck through newspaper records.

2. Maritime History: About the Alvin Clark Schooner — The Scuba News

   Featured image record. Published Jul. 26, 2023. Accessed Jul. 19, 2026. Copyright The Scuba News; cited.

   Supports: Built 1846 or 1847; 105-foot, 218-ton white oak lumber schooner with two masts; sailing empty toward Oconto for lumber when lost; uncontrolled drying of waterlogged wood causes shrinking and cracking; demolished with the Mystery Ship Seaport in 1994 for a parking lot.

3. Alvin Clark (schooner) — Wikipedia

   Featured image record. Accessed Jul. 19, 2026. CC BY-SA text; cited.

   Supports: Built at the Bates and Davis shipyard in Trenton, Michigan, likely by John Clark, who had a son named Alvin; moored at the Mystery Ship Seaport at the foot of Sixth Avenue in Menominee; Michigan historic site 1972; National Register 1974; listing removed June 10, 2020; seaport and remains demolished 1994.

4. The Mystery Ship: Tale of the Alvin Clark Tragedy — Land-O-Lakes Classic Boat Club

   Featured image record. Accessed Jul. 19, 2026. Copyright LOLCBC; brief quotation with attribution.

   Supports: A wood expert warned in a February 26, 1969 letter, before the lift, that the schooner would be better left in her watery grave; the final lifting took place Tuesday, July 29, 1969 at the Marinette Marine docks; the remnants were demolished with a bulldozer in May 1994.

   One of the two short quotations in the article is a twelve-word fragment of the expert letter as reproduced here.

5. 1985 wire report on the Alvin Clark fire, reproduced — Chicagology archive

   Featured image record. Accessed Jul. 19, 2026. Archived contemporaneous reporting; brief quotation with attribution.

   Supports: In 1985 Hoffman was arrested after allegedly brandishing a rifle to keep police and firefighters from the burning ship; the Mystery Ship Preservation Society faced mounting debts; the police chief remarked the boat had not been a blessing for Frank; the ship vanished with three crewmen in a June 1864 squall.

   Second short quotation in the article is the eight-word police chief remark.

6. Menominee, Michigan July 1976: The Mystery Ship at 19 Fathoms — Toys and Stuff travelogue, quoting encyclopedic summary

   Featured image record. Published Jul. 21, 2020. Accessed Jul. 19, 2026. Personal travelogue; cited.

   Supports: No conservation plan existed; Hoffman group excluded museum and historical society representatives; compensation demands frustrated placement; roughly 300,000 dollars of debt; deterioration began immediately once freed from cold, low-oxygen water; 1987 sale of the hulk to local investors for 117,000 dollars.

Photo and media credits

1. AlvinClark.jpg — Charles K. Hyde / Wikimedia Commons

   Featured image record. Accessed Jul. 19, 2026. Public domain; credit Charles K. Hyde.

   Supports: Featured image: the schooner Alvin Clark on display at Menominee, circa 1978. Local copy used at original resolution without cropping.

   Documentation photograph, small original resolution.

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