Tragedy Struck 95 Years Ago On West Lake Okoboji

Because they thought bodies could be trapped in the hull of Miss Thriller, the recovery process of the vessel began immediately on the morning of Monday, July 29, 1929. Volunteers used grappling hooks over the side of the Queen, trying to snag Miss Thriller 96 feet below. On an early pass, a hook caught some of the wooden seats, unfortunately tearing them away, and the boards flew to the surface with such force that they jumped six feet out of the water.

After another good hold, 25 men stretched along the line down the center of the Queen. On both catches, the line snapped under the weight of the four-ton launch and Miss Thriller stayed below.

Another attempt for recovery took place the following morning. Officials wanted to investigate the hull for whatever clues it might provide. Several more attempts took place over the following weeks, but difficulties continued to arise with recovering the launch.

By late October, Frank Long announced the boat would be recovered once the lake froze. Markers were used on the ice over the wreck, but it wasn’t until mid-February 1930 when official efforts took place. By then, shifting ice made the markers useless and new efforts to locate the wreck were needed. A crew of men chopped holes in the ice and probed the bottom with coupled lengths of gas pipe. It was tedious work, and it took them almost two weeks to locate Miss Thriller.

The boat had settled at the bottom of West Lake at an angle, with her bow off the bottom and her stern in the mud. Chains were wrapped around the framework and a windlass on the ice cinched the loop tight to allow lifting. By now, the ice cover was slowly retreating, so the men worked day and night and were able to raise the boat about 30 feet. Unfortunately, on March 9, Miss Thriller slipped out of the chain and back to the bottom. Five days later, the ice broke apart and efforts to recover the vessel were abandoned again.

The following summer, the boat’s new owners still desired to retrieve the famous boat and salvage its engines. They began searching for a deep-sea diver to raise the boat from the lake bottom.

“In the 1930s, hardhat divers generally limited their diving to about 30 feet of water. Most considered deeper dives too dangerous; they would be working in the dark and risked developing the bends, which at Miss Thriller’s depth could be life-threatening,” Cunningham wrote.

The first three divers contacted refused to consider the recovery. However, in June, Captain Horace Herbert Thompson of Duluth, MN and his son John, agreed to take a look. Thompson had grown up along the Great Lakes and had crewed his father’s tugboat and piloted multiple steamships between Duluth, Chicago, and Buffalo, New York. In 1898, after a devastating dynamite explosion killed a hardhat diver working in the Duluth Ship Canal, Thompson bought the damaged gear, had it refurbished and began hiring himself out as a submarine diver.

By 1930, Thompson had become an experienced diver of underwater construction, dangerous structures, wreck salvaging, and splintered decks. He was willing to travel to West Lake Okoboji and attempt to bring Miss Thriller to the surface.

Like what can be currently seen in the Iowa Great Lakes Maritime Museum, Cunningham said, “Thompson’s diving equipment included a canvas suit and a 55-pound helmet, a 60-pound lead weighted diving vest, a pair of brass boots that weighted 18 pounds each and a hand-pumped air compressor.”

Thompson’s son John watched the tethering line and rubber hose that provided air to the suit, as well as directed the compressor’s operation. Climbing aboard the deputy sheriff’s motor launch, Iona, Thompson was taken to the wreck site and then climbed down the attached ladder to the last rung, held a line anchored near the site and became the first person to dive West Lake Okoboji.

At a depth of 96 feet, Thompson searched for Miss Thriller. This depth was 35 feet deeper than he’d ever been in his entire life and it was dark and cold. He used his weighted boot in the deep muck to scratch the bottom, trying to locate the boat.

“Thompson left no record of what search pattern he used or whether it was experience, instinct, or perhaps mere good luck that guided his steps, but he located the launch. His examination of the launch told him she was bottom up, turned over during the attempt in spring to bring her to the surface,” Cunningham wrote.

Miss Thriller’s engine-heavy stern was deep in the muddy bottom. Thompson attached a line to the hull to help his return to the top. He had been on the bottom of West Lake for over three hours.

He took a second dive on Tuesday afternoon, following the line directly down. Working from the knees, he dug through the mud around the transom, uncovering the propellers and wrapping a chain around the drive shafts. From there, he hooked it to a 5/8-inch steel cable that was attached to the Queen. Unfortunately, in the first attempt the steamer pitched badly to one side under the strain and the cable snapped.

Thompson went back down the following day with a new plan to use a double-pull to raise the launch. He wrapped a chain around the entire stern of Miss Thriller and secured a large pulley to the chain. A cable was then fed from a windlass on the Queen’s deck through the pulley and taken back up to the surface, where it was secured to a second windlass. At times, the crew pulled with one or both windlasses alongside the steamer’s towing power to free Miss Thriller from the deep muck.

Success. The Queen slowly towed Miss Thriller toward Brown’s Bay where her bow dragged across the sand once shallow water was reached. The steamer dragged her as close to Terrace Park Beach as her bottom would allow, and from there, the sunken launch would be pulled upon shore from the beach.

Thompson continued to use his diving prowess alongside the Queen and Iona to bring Miss Thriller up on the beach. A 12-ton gas tractor was brought down to the lake to help from land. At noon on July 4th, 1930, 11 months and eight days since that fatal crash – Miss Thriller was pulled onto shore.

“Miss Thriller was a sorry sight, ravaged by the crash and the recovery efforts. Her decking was splintered. Her seats were pulled apart and broken by grappling hooks that also left scars along her deck, sides and bottom,” Cunningham wrote. “The long, deep dives of the recovery took a toll on Captain Thompson. He later would say that recovering Miss Thriller was the most difficult feat of his 32 years of diving.”

Before leaving the Lakes, Thompson allowed several people to wear his diving suit and walk along the lake bottom from the beach at Arnolds Park. The boat’s owner also tried to exhibit the launch, but the public resisted the idea and several months later, Miss Thriller landed in a junk pile in Milford and was later burned by a victim's family member.

In the Maritime Museum, close to the building’s mascot, the only remaining piece of Miss Thriller is on display.

“We have the broken prop shaft, which is the only known piece of Miss Thriller to still exist,” said Mary Kennedy, curator of the Iowa Great Lakes Maritime Museum. “There may be a few other pieces still remaining at the bottom of the Lake, but the rest is gone.”

The diving suit that stands at the museum’s entrance is like what Thompson would’ve worn during his dives in 1930. Mary’s brother-in-law Jim found the diving gear in Tennessee and sent it to Arnolds Park.

“This helps show people what Thompson would’ve worn while he was rescuing Miss Thriller,” she shared.

She added that the accident will be one of West Lake’s tragic memories and she’s thankful the museum can be a memorial for that fatal day.

To learn more about Miss Thriller, visit the Maritime Museum in Arnolds Park or by reading Lloyd B. Cunningham’s captivating book, “The Death Boat.”