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CANADIAN JOURNALIST SOLVES GRIFFON MYSTERY

By Bob Kostoff

The fate of the Griffon, explorer LaSalle's ship, lost somewhere in the Great Lakes, has intrigued detectives of history for hundreds of years.

A Canadian journalist seems to have solved the mystery. John MacLean, in his 1974 book, "The Fate of the Griffon," is convinced remains of an old ship found in a remote cove off Georgian Bay, not far from Tobermory, Ontario, is that of LaSalle's ship. And he has convinced some Canadian experts.

MacLean's involvement came in 1955, when he was a reporter for the Toronto Telegram, and an acquaintance living at Tobermory, Orrie Vail, told him of finding old wreckage in the cove. Vail said his grandfather and father knew of the wreckage. Vail said, "I've gone over to look at her hundreds of times." He even salvaged some parts of the stern and brought up old nails and bolts. The remaining wreckage, he said, included "the entire keel, bow, stern, thirteen ribs and quite a bit of planking on the port side."

MacLean's research ruled out other reported finds of the Griffon. The first one was the discovery of an anchor and two cannons in Lake Erie near Hamburg, another at Fitzwilliam Island in Georgian Bay, and another at Manitoulin Island in that area. All proved to be ships other than the Griffon.

One sticking point was that the length of the keel in the Vail find indicated the ship was about 40 tons burden. Father Louis Hennepin, who accompanied LaSalle in his explorations, in one book said the Griffon was 42 tons and in a later writing that it was 60 "tuns." MacLean learned that, in historic mariner terms, "tons" was dead weight, while "tuns" was "not a weight but the cubic space a barrel occupies in stowage." Thus, a ship of 40 tons burden could carry 60 tuns of cargo.

One of the bolts Vail found was without threads but held by a washer and a wedge into a slit in the bottom of the bolt. MacLean learned from Marine experts that threaded bolts did not come into use in ship building until after the Griffon was built.

He also had a sliver of the salvaged wood analyzed and it turned out to be white oak, the material of which Hennepin indicated the Griffon was constructed.

Vail and MacLean brought up the rest of the wreckage and stored it at Vail's place at Tobermory for inspection by experts.

Next time, we will relate what the experts decided and how the Griffon got into such a remote cove in the first place.


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Bob Kostoff has been reporting on the Niagara Frontier for four decades. He is a recognized authority on local history and is the author of several books. E-mail him at RKost1@aol.com.

Niagara Falls Reporter www.niagarafallsreporter.com June 3 2003