Tag Archives: History

The Great Tampa Gale of 1848

Posted on September 7, 2025 by Fred Pickhardt

The air hung heavy and still on the morning of Saturday, September 23, 1848, a stillness that felt less like peace and more like a held breath. The few hundred residents of the tiny village of Tampa and the soldiers stationed at Fort Brooke, surrounded by a largely unsettled Florida wilderness, had no modern warnings. The only signals were the phosphorescent glow that lit up the bay that night and an ominous, oppressive sultriness. Continue reading →

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The Flying Enterprise story of Man vs. the Sea

Posted on December 23, 2015 by Fred Pickhardt

During Christmas Week, 1951, began an incredible sea story involving a WWII era cargo vessel named the Flying Enterprise and her captain, Kurt Carlsen.  Captain Carlsen was a Danish-born seaman that began his sea career at the age of 14. … Continue reading →

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1950 Super Storm Remembered

Posted on November 24, 2015 by Fred Pickhardt

I was only 2 years old at the time but still have some hazy distant memory of a storm that may have initiated my interest in meteorology later in life. I was living in Passaic, NJ at the time in … Continue reading →

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Gales of November

Posted on November 6, 2015 by Fred Pickhardt

On November 10, 1975 the Great Lakes bulk cargo vessel SS Edmund Fitzgerald carrying a cargo of taconite pellets (iron-bearing flint-like rock used in steelmaking) sank with the loss of all 29 crewmembers in eastern Lake Superior about 17 miles from the … Continue reading →

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