Mark L. Thompson has 3 audiobooks on Listento.it, narrated by 2 narrators. The most-rated is Graveyard of the Lakes.
Steamboats and Sailors of the Great Lakes
Summary
The Great Lakes shipping industry can trace its lineage to 1679 with the launching on Lake Erie of the Griffon, a 60-foot galley weighing nearly 50 tons. Built by LaSalle, a French explorer who had been commissioned to search for a passage through North America to China, it was the first sailing ship to operate on the upper lakes, signaling the dawn of the Great Lakes shipping industry as we know it today.
Steamboats and Sailors of the Great Lakes is the most thorough and factual study of the Great Lakes shipping industry written this century. Author Mark L. Thompson tells the fascinating story of the world's most efficient bulk transportation system, describing the Great Lakes freighters, the cargoes of the great ships, and the men and women who have served as crew. He documents the dramatic changes that have taken places in the industry and looks at the critical role that Great Lakes shipping plays in the economic well-being of the US and Canada, despite the fact that the size of the fleet and the amount of cargo carried have declined dramatically in recent years.
Spanning more than three centuries, from LaSalle's voyage in 1679, through 1975 with the mysterious sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald, to life aboard today's thousand-foot behemoths, this important volume documents the evolution of the industry through its "Golden Age" at the end of the 19th century to the present, with a downsized US fleet that numbers fewer than 70 vessels.
The book is published by Wayne State University Press. The audiobook is published by University Press Audiobooks.
©1991 Wayne State University Press (P)2018 Redwood Audiobooks
Queen of the Lakes (Great Lakes Books Series)
Summary
This book is an account of ships that have borne the name Queen of the Lakes, an honorary title indicating that, at the time of its launching, a ship is the longest on the Great Lakes. In one of the most comprehensive books ever written on the maritime history of the lakes, Mark Thompson presents a vignette of each of the dozens of ships that have held the title, chronicling the dates the ship sailed, its dimensions, the derivation of its name, its role in the economic development of the region, and its sailing history. Through the stories of the individual ships, Thompson also describes the growth of ship design on the Great Lakes and the changing nature of the shipping industry on the lakes. The launching of the fist ship on Lake Ontario in 1678 - the diminutive Frontenac, a small, two-masted vessel of only about 10 tons and no more than 40 or 45 feet long - set in motion an evolutionary process that has continued for more than 300 years. That ship is the direct ancestor of all the ships that ever have operated on the Great Lakes, from the Str. Onoko, launched in February 1882 and the first ship to bear the name Queen of the Lakes, to the Str. W. D. Rees, which held its title only for a few weeks, to the Tregurtha, the longest ship on the lakes in 1981. Although the ships on the Great Lakes may be surpassed in size and efficiency by many of the modern ocean freighters, Thompson notes that the ships now sailing on the great freshwater seas of North America have achieved a level of operating mastery that is unrivaled anywhere in the world, considering the inherent limitations of the Great Lakes system. This audiobook is published by University Press Audiobooks.
©1994 Wayne State University Press (P)2018 Redwood Audiobooks
Graveyard of the Lakes
Summary
For the first time, a historian and seasoned mariner looks beyond the specific circumstances of individual shipwrecks in an effort to reach a clearer understanding of the economic, political, and psychological factors that have influenced the 25,000 wrecks on the Great Lakes over the past 300 years. Looking at the entire tragic history of shipwrecks on North America's expansive inland seas, from the 1679 loss of the Griffon to the mysterious sinking of the Edmund Fitzgerald in 1975, Mark L. Thompson concludes that a wreck is not an isolated event. In Graveyard of the Lakes, Thompson suggests that most of the accidents and deaths on the lakes have been the result of human error, ranging from simple mistakes to gross incompetence. In addition to his compelling analysis of the causes of shipwrecks, Thompson includes factual accounts of more than 100 wrecks. Graveyard of the Lakes will forever change the listener's perspective on shipwrecks. The book is published by Wayne State University Press.
©2000 Wayne State University Press (P)2017 Redwood Audiobooks