France claims historic Great Lakes wreck

[EFerrari]

France claims historic Great Lakes wreck
By Randy Boswell, Canwest News ServiceFebruary 17, 2009

The French government has formally moved to lay claim to one of Canadian history's most important shipwrecks — if, as a U.S. relic hunter believes, the 330-year-old Griffon has been discovered at the bottom of Lake Michigan.

The Griffon, built in 1679 near today's Niagara Falls, Ont., by French explorer Rene-Robert de La Salle, became the first sailing ship on the Great Lakes but was lost in a storm that year on its maiden voyage.

In 2004, U.S. wreck diver Steve Libert discovered remnants of what he suspects is a 17th-century shipwreck at the north end of Green Bay, near the boundary waters of Michigan and Wisconsin.

Experts from Chicago's Field Museum have dated wood samples collected at the wreck site to the era of the Griffon, a 25-metre vessel expected to be the flagship of the fur trade empire New France was building in the fledgling days of the future Canada.

http://www.canada.com/Technology/story.html?id=1299362

[B o d i]

1. You can have it good, cheap, or fast. Pick two.

Cheap and fast? Okie dokie!

[applegrove]

2. How exciting.