Nautical Festival mug, brochure now available

Now only two months away, the Nautical City Festival schedule is now available. This year?s Nautical City Festival Committee has again put together a great array of events which start with the July 29 Miss Rogers City Queen?s Pageant. The festival ends with traditionally one of the best fireworks displays in northern Michigan on Sunday, August 7.

In between time, there are events going on at Lakeside Park, dinners at various locations, and great sounding bands at the festival tent. The brochures, featuring a photograph of the schooner Madeline on the cover, and a portrait of Miss Rogers City 2010, Rachel Lewandowski on the inside, are available at many locations throughout the area, including the Rogers City Area Chamber of Commerce and the Advance office.

In other festival news, this year?s commemorative mug for the Nautical City Festival honors the M/V Edwin H. Gott, captained by Rogers City nativ

e Mike Gapczynski. According to Mark Thompson, curator of the Presque Isle County Historical Museum, the Gott was launched in 1978 as the first 1,000-footer in U.S. Steel?s Pittsburg Steamship Company. The ship measures 1,004 feet long and 105 feel wide with a hull depth of 56 feet.

Thompson said the freighter operates almost exclusively in the iron ore trade, carrying ore from Minnesota?s Mesabi Range to steel mills and transshipment ports along the lower lakes. Fully loaded the Gott can carry more than 60,000 tons of cargo, powered by two 16-cylinder diesel engines, which produce 19,500 horsepower.

The Gott is named after the former chairman and CEO of U.S. Steel from 1967 until 1973. He graduated from Lehigh University and joined U.S. Steel in 1937 as an industrial engineer and served various positions until he replaced Roger Blough as chairman. Today, the Gott is one of thirteen 1,000-footers to operate on the Great Lakes, and operates as part of the Great Lakes Fleet. The mugs are available to purchase at the Rogers City Chamber of Commerce office on Bradley Highway.

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