The second of Marilynn Erickson's three stories about her family history. She wrote each story “to check out the verbal family stories and connect them to documentation and photos.”

This second story is about the Sea Wing disaster.

On July 13, 1890, 15-year-old Phoebe A. Bearson (1875 - 1890) joined her friends and neighbors on a paddle boat cruise down the Mississippi River from Red Wing to Lake City, Minnesota....Returning back up river the Sea Wing entered Lake Pepin at 8 pm...It is uncertain whether the boat was hit by a tornado or straight line winds, but the violent storm caused the shallow-bottomed Sea Wing to flip over.