Lake Superior Wreck Found! SS Henry Steinbrenner. Our Casualty: Earl Hemmingson.

In Memory of Patricia Carmen Dybedal Nelson (7 April 1929 – 18 June 2023)
Niece of Earl Hemmingson

Earl Hemmingson, wheelsman, drowned with the sinking of the freighter SS Henry Steinbrenner, on Lake Superior. It was May 11, 1953 in raging weather. The wreckage was recently located as reported on September 27, 2023, by Andrew Kreuger for mprnews.org.

Earl came from the very large, close family displayed below. He assumed work on the Great Lakes around age forty, after which he was necessarily less available to them, so his last fifteen years became murky in family lore.

Kreuger’s piece captured a long ago photographed article from the Duluth Herald of May 12, 1953 that left Earl’s family keen to fill in the gaps.¹ It reported that “his wife Edna said”, but the rest of the article did not appear. Did he have a wife, Edna?

Pat Nelson would surely have known; she was the daughter of his sister, Mildred Dybedal. This dear nonagenarian was the last of her generation – Dad’s generation – and she was particularly sharp, but had just left us. Daughters of Pat’s sisters, Marge and Win, reached out: Beth and VaLois, respectively.

Correction: Pat was not the last of her generation! Her very much younger sister, Sharon, survives. Dreadful mistake! Her birth actually followed the author’s, and was source of the lapse. Huge apologies; the sister group is now pictured with their mother, after Notes and Sources. Thanks for the catch, Beth.

No marital record has been found for Earl, nor any perfect link to one Edna Marie McGibbon May, whom we now assume he wed. Clues on which we suspect so, follow.

Earl was born Ole Marion Hemmingson on 22 June 1900 to Ole Hemmingson and Alette Ingebrigtsdatter in Mason, Wisconsin. He took “Earl” by 1930. At that time, he was living in Chicago with his brother, Paul, while working as an auto repairman.²

He worked for his brother, Henry, for the latter half of the thirties, while residing in Duluth, with his widowed mother.³ Henry owned The Hemmingson Company, a successful auto repair that began with welding, then grew to a manufacturing enterprise.

Earl left Duluth around 1940; that year’s census found him lodging in Milwaukee as a wheelsman looking for a job. The census indicated he was married, but no wife was listed. He was not found in Census 1950, which would have clarified the marriage issue.

Curiously: As previously shown, Earl was in Milwaukee in 1940, married, with no wife listed. The same census said an Edna Hemmingson lived in Superior, WI. She was a waitress, born in Minnesota in 1906; a married lodger, with no husband listed. It also noted her as resident in Superior in 1935. As well, one James Tate May lived in Cleveland OH in 1940, a divorced sailor, likewise a resident of Superior in 1935.

One cannot be certain that our Earl wed this Edna without direct support. The circumstantial record was strong in that Earl often docked in Superior WI for work.⁴ Edna’s residence was filled with many lodgers, including personnel from Great Lake boats. That she was married, while her first husband claimed divorce status, suggests she re-married by 1940. See Note A for further debate on the selection of this Edna for Earl.

The pictured 1953 article shows Earl’s address to be Route 6, Box 571, Duluth MN. That was the same address as published in the 1952 City Directory of Duluth for brother Henry. While neither Earl nor Edna Hemmingson are found in Census 1950, both the house enumerated before and after Henry’s was marked “no one home”.

Earl was actively employed on the Great Lakes as evidenced by many Passenger and Crew List arrival notices. One of his last trips was on the Steinbrenner as one of three wheelsmen out of Fort William, Ontario. They docked in Oswego, NY on April 28, 1953. That gives a small insight into his exciting life.

Edna Marie McGibbon Hemmingson (1906-1969) has Memorial ID 65401072 at Findagrave.com. Edna McGibbon married James May in Ohio in 1930, with whom she had three children. One son died at birth. the second in 1940. Step-father, Earl would have shared that grief, along with Edna’s surviving daughter. Edna was born and died in Duluth.

Earl was acquainted with tragedy, having lost his father at three. Of his half-siblings, Marie was lost to TB just before he entered the world, Harry to a gruesome logging accident soon after, followed by George, the night after a kitchen table appendectomy and Torger drowned in a work related event. Nothing could linger longer than the five-year-old’s grief over his sister, Grace, felled by a gunshot, accidentally spent by young brother, Clarence.

Earl still met adulthood confidently, with his secure job as a mechanic. As the 1940s loomed, he was ten years beyond what was then middle age. He burst forth, got married and gained step-children. He embraced a hard life of risky adventure on the glorious Great Lakes. We grieve his awful end, softened by the fact that his last fifteen years were both chosen and likely fulfilling.

Please place comments and questions in the Reply Box after Notes and Sources.

Notes and Sources

Note A: Other factors weighing on the selection of this Edna are: A) No official record changing Ole to Earl was found. Earl was seen in 1930 and only Earl was noted in forward documents such as Social Security, Draft Cards and Death Records.^5,6 Family knew, but if others were to do a genealogy tree for Earl, they would not find his birth record or early life. B) Earl’s WW II Draft Registration was completed in 1942. It did not query marital status, but Henry was given for “who will always know your address?” leaving a question on his status. C) this Edna is addressed in a family tree that cites Earl Hemmingson as her second husband. Only two data are given: Birth 1905 MN (versus our 1900 WI), but with no citation and the 1953 death. Search on those birth particulars have no output, pointing back to factor A.

Much background material for this post has been previously documented on this blog. Specific to this post:
1 Harrowing stories resurface in newly discovered Lake Superior Shipwreck. Andrew Kreuger mprnews.org 27 Sep 2023.
2 U.S. Federal Censuses 1920-1950 (NARA via Ancestry.com) for Earl Hemmingson b. 1900 Wisconsin, Edna McGibbon May Hemmingson b 1906 Minnesota and James Tate (Tait) May.
3 U.S. City Directories 1822-1995 for Duluth MN at Ancestry.com for Hemmingson.
4 New York State, Passenger and Crew Lists 1917-1967 and Wisconsin US, Arriving Passenger and Crew Lists, 1922 -1963 for Earl Hemmingson, at Ancestry.com
5 War II Draft Cards Young Men 1940-1947 for Earl Marion Hemmingson at Ancestry.com
6 U.S. Social Security Applications and Claims Index 1936-2007 at Ancestry.com