At 4 a.m. on Saturday, 22 November 1879, the 135-foot freight and passenger steamer Waubuno left Collingwood, Ontario, on her last run of the season to Parry Sound on eastern Georgian Bay. Engulfed by a snowstorm, she never arrived. Not a single body was recovered. There was never a government enquiry, despite widespread calls for one.
“Here’s a small-press book that sets out to revitalize the history of Canada’s Great Lakes steamships — and proves wonderfully successful…Exhaustively researched, the book sets a new standard for works on Great Lakes shipwrecks.”
—Ken McGoogan, author of Dead Reckoning, Lady Franklin’s Revenge, Shadows of Tyranny, and many other fine works of non-fiction.
The steamer’s loss is a dramatic mystery, and more: a tale of politics and influence, of regulatory failures, of Great Lakes storms, shipwrecks, and navigation hazards, and of a widow’s determination to hold a vessel’s owners accountable for the loss of her husband. The full story of this nautical disaster — and of the disasters that immediately followed, involving the same ship owners —is told by one of Canada’s most accomplished authors, after sixteen years of research in archives and on the waters in which the Waubuno was lost.
For anyone interested in not only the mystery of the Waubuno but also the history of Great Lakes shipping and other losses like the Simcoe and Asia, Frightful Disaster! is a must read. As well, the effort of Emma Fisher to hold the Waubuno‘s owner’s accountable for the loss of her husband, Parry Sound North Star publisher and editor Baptist Noel Fisher, resulted in two sensational trials — now forgotten — involving some of the finest lawyers of the time. Frightful Disaster! reveals perjury, witness theft, evidence tampering, unrecognized allegiances between witnesses and defendants, and even political debts of the presiding judge.
The book’s research is first-rate. Hunter knows his way around archives, and he’s also a sailor with solid experience and knowledge of boat building as well as ship dynamics. Very few people have all of those skills, and they are used skillfully in Frightful Disaster.…A dramatic story told by a skilled historian who is careful to avoid speculation but still, through hard work, delivers the goods.
—Mark Bourrie, author of Bush Runner, Crosses in the Sky, and many other fine works of non-fiction.
Frightful Disaster! is extensively illustrated with more than 100 archival images, photos, and original maps by the author. The book is designed by the author, who has enjoyed a longstanding career in graphic design and illustration and has previously packaged his own books for leading publishers, including Penguin Canada and W.W. Norton.
Douglas Hunter is the author of more than twenty works of non- fiction. He is a past winner of Canada’s National Business Award and a finalist for the Governor General’s Literary Award, the Writers’ Trust Non-Fiction Prize, the Dafoe Book Prize, and the Wilson Book Prize in Canadian History. He has a PhD in history from York University, and holds two marine archaaeology site licences for Georgian Bay in 2026. Learn more at douglashunter.ca.
Frightful Disaster!: The Disappearance of the Great Lakes Steamer Waubuno, and the Pursuit of Justice for All Who Were Lost, by Douglas Hunter. Published by Gin Rocks Press, May 1, 2025.
394 pages. 106 black-and-white images. Indexed.
ISBN paperback 978-1-0692413-0-6
ISBN ebook 978-1-0692413-1-3
Review copies available on request
HOW TO BUY
Order from our secure online store
Read the free sample of the first six chapters on Google Play, or read the excerpt of Chapter 10 below