Ghost Ships Festival

01/08/2024

Ghost Ships is returning! Stay tuned for more information.

01/10/2018

It is with heavy hearts that Jon and I announce that there will not be a Ghost Ships 2018. The time commitment required, while juggling full time careers and family demands has become too much for the two of us to bear. Unfortunately we just can't continue to provide the quality that has come to be associated with the Ghost Ships Festival. As we look to the future, expanding the board of directors, a new venue and a new way forward will be explored. For 18 years this has been such an important part of my life and it wouldn't have been possible without all of you. Thank you...and thank you to my co-directors and faithful volunteers who helped bring the Ghost Ships Festival to life each year in Milwaukee.

~ Brad

08/09/2017

The Senator sunk to the bottom of Lake Michigan in 1929, after a collision with another ship. Two divers were the first to survey the shipwreck on Saturday.

06/12/2017

03/13/2017

The Ghost Ships Festival crew would like to thank everyone for a wonderful 18th annual show! Thank you to all for the wonderful memories, comments and great advice. In the coming weeks we will be selecting a new home for the festival in the greater Milwaukee area. Until that happens, our 2018 date is on hold, however we will be announcing it on Facebook and our website as soon as that happens. If anyone has any suggestions on a location, please send them to [email protected].

03/13/2017

03/09/2017

A German U-Boat and Hundreds of Military Aircraft at the Bottom of Lake Michigan?

Learn more at this Weekend's Ghost Ships Festival
"Shipwrecks & Aircraft Wrecks: Bringing Once Lost History Back to Life"

Crowne Plaza, Milwaukee Airport
Concorde A Presentation Hall
2:00pm-2:45pm

Join explorer and side scan sonar expert Taras Lyssenko as he tells tales of mystery and intrigue as he and members of his team search the vast expanse of our lakes in search of our maritime past. Taras will share what his business, A & T Recovery does to bring awareness of these wondrous stories to the American public. These stories include some of the most unique pieces of sunken maritime history that most people don’t even know exist in our lakes. Military vessels, airplanes and historic shipwrecks are just some of the countless targets Taras and his team have discovered in the depths.

Just what does Taras have in store for us this weekend? It's a mystery......join us at 2:00pm and find out!

03/09/2017

Coming this Saturday March 11th to the Ghost Ships Festival

"Sailing Tales from Presque Isle, Michigan"
Presented by extreme explorer Jitka Hanakova

Crowne Plaza, Milwaukee Airport
Concorde A Presentation Hall
1:00pm-1:45pm

The Great Lakes are not just any lakes; they are large and sometimes referred to as the “inland seas”. The storms come out of nowhere and can create large steep waves in a short period of time. The winds sometimes reach hurricane force, wreaking havoc across the lakes. Ships traveled across these lakes for their livelihood and moved goods and natural resources from port to port. Sometimes these ships never reached their final destinations. It wasn’t just the bad weather that caused these wrecks, the fogs and lack of good navigation also caused ships to run into each other.
What was it like to sail the Great Lakes back in those times? Why are there so many wrecked schooners in and around Presque Isle Michigan? Join Jitka Hanakova in uncovering the mysterious sinking, the life of the families and crew members and their stories; as well as underwater photos of these schooners as they proudly sit on the bottom as if waiting to catch another wind and sail away into history

03/08/2017

More New Shipwreck Discoveries Featured at this Weekends Ghost Ships Festival!

"Fire, Wind and Waves"
The newly discovered wrecks of the Venus and Montezuma
Saturday, March 11th - 10am-1045am
Crowne Plaza, Milwaukee Airport

Join one of the Great Lakes most accomplished wreck hunters this weekend in Milwaukee. David Trotter is back at Ghost Ships to tell the tale of discovery of two newly discovered wrecks in Lake Huron...the Venus and Montezuma.

The Great Lakes are loaded with shipwrecks. Thousands have been discovered over the years but many are still waiting in the depths, untouched by man since they plied the surface of our sweet water seas.
Two schooners that foundered on Lake Huron back in the late 1800s have remained Michigan maritime mysteries for well over a century, until they were both recently discovered by renowned shipwreck hunter David Trotter.
The Venus, which has been on Trotter’s bucket list for quite some time, was found 40 miles off the coast of Pointe Aux Barques, Michigan. Once an image appeared on his side-scan sonar, Trotter sent three divers down to the treacherous depth of nearly 300 feet to confirm the identity of the mystery schooner. The load of grindstones in her hold told her tale and revealed her name.

In June 2016, Trotter and his dive team found another wreck, the schooner Montezuma, which went down in Lake Huron Oct. 3, 1871. Trotter was excited about finding the Montezuma because she was one of the earliest-built vintage schooners of the time period. Trotter and his team were searching in Lake Huron about 35 miles east of Oscoda, Michigan, when an image appeared on the side-scan sonar in an approximate depth of 170 feet.
The day the Montezuma sank, a heavy haze caused by enormous fires near the area had made visibility nearly impossible. Despite the conditions, the shipping lanes in Lake Huron remained open and active. According to historical records, the schooner Hattie Johnson was traveling two points off her course when suddenly a green light of the Montezuma appeared across her bow. The Johnson struck the Montezuma just forward of the main rigging with such force the Montezuma was nearly split in half. As the Montezuma was sinking, its crew abandoned ship and went aboard the Hattie Johnson, which sustained some damage, but wasn't sinking.
Trotter is thrilled to be able to go public with these two discoveries and to be able to share the history, discovery and underwater footage his divers were able to collect with the Ghost Ships Festival.

03/08/2017

New Discoveries presented at the Ghost Ships Festival this coming weekend!

"Ghost of the White Hurricane" The discovery of one of the last missing victims from the Great Storm of 1913
Saturday, March 11th, 2017 - 5:00pm-5:45pm
Crowne Plaza, Milwaukee Airport.

Join of the the Great Lakes most accomplished wreck hunters......David Trotter as he shares with us the discovery of the shipwreck Hydrus!

The sky unleashed a blizzard over the Great Lakes, hitting Lake Huron hardest with wind gusts up to 90 m.p.h. and waves to 35 feet. The Great Storm, even today, is the worst recorded on the lakes. There were a dozen major shipwrecks from Nov. 7 through 10, and eight of them were on Lake Huron. More than 250 people perished. The Hydrus had been headed south toward the St. Clair River, iron ore in its belly. The ship lost everyone on board, a crew of 22, including five found frozen to death in a lifeboat that washed up in Canada. Since that time, every ship lost in the Great Storm of 1913 in U.S. waters in Lake Huron has been discovered except the Hydrus. Veteran shipwreck hunter David Trotter has had it on his wanted list for 30 years. Along the way, he has found scores of other ships and even a few airplanes as he scours Lake Huron’s bottom every year with his crew. It was Trotter who, in 1985, found another of the 1913 casualties, the John A. McGean, which was heading north in Lake Huron with a load of coal when it went down. Other ships from this storm have been found turtled, or upside-down, and collapsed to the point where they are tough to explore. The video Trotter’s team shot confirms the Hydrus is a divers' dream. Join David Trotter as he recounts the history, research, discovery and exploration of the Great Storm of 1913 shipwreck, the Hydrus.