Eastland Disaster

On the morning of July 24, 1915, the lake passenger steamer Eastland cast off from the Chicago River dock at the Clark Street Bridge with 2,572 people aboard.

Immediately the ship listed away from the dock, righted herself, listed again and slowly rolled over on her side and settled on the mud of the river bottom.

Some of those on board, all Western Electric Company employees and their families, were able to jump into the water and swim ashore, but 844 excursionists lost their lives before rescuers reached them, making the Eastland disaster by far the worst in the city's history in terms of loss of life.

The excursion steamer Eastland slowly rolled over at 7:28 a.m. Saturday, July 24, 1915. She was still moored to her dock between LaSalle and Clark Streets on the south bank of the Chicago River. Of the 2,572 persons on board, 844 perished--making this Chicago's worst single disaster. The passengers were Western Electric employees, their friends and family going to an annual company picnic in Michigan City, Indiana.

The causes of the disaster are still subject to debate, but several facts are clear. The steamer had a reputation for being top-heavy and had at several times in the past been reported as listing in an alarming way. Her water ballasting system was regarded as dangerously unstable by many persons. A series of modifications had steadily increased the top-heavy tendency of the vessel. These modifications made her so unsteady that with a full passenger load of 2,500 persons she could be kept upright only through exceptional seamanship. The owners, captain and engineers were apparently not aware of the dangers posed by her instability and did not compensate properly. Thus she turned turtle the first time a full passenger load was taken aboard after the last modification. Ironically, the fatal addition was more lifeboats.

Lawsuits continued for more than twenty years. The Eastland itself was rapidly refloated, towed to South Chicago, renamed the Wilimette and refitted as a naval training vessel. She survived as a naval training vessel until she was broken up for scrap in 1947.

By late that afternoon, nearly 200 bodies had been taken to the 2nd Regiment Armory on West Washington Blvd. According to newspaper accounts, a police diver who had been hauling bodies up from the bottom of the river since mid-morning suddenly broke down and became crazed. He had to be subdued by several of his friends and fellow officers. City workers began dragging the river far south of where the ship had capsized, using large nets to stop the bodies from washing out into the lake. By the time that it was all over, 835 of the ships passengers perished, including 22 entire families.

The mystery of the EASTLAND was never solved. There was never a clear cause that could be reached that accounted for the capsizing of the vessel. Several hundred lawsuits were eventually filed but almost all of them were thrown out by the Circuit Court of Appeals, who held the owners of the steamship blameless in the disaster. The EASTLAND was later sold at public auction in December 1915. The title was later transferred to the government and it was pressed into duty as the gunboat USS WILMETTE. In 1946, it was sold for scrap metal.