Margaret Brennecke, 21, student, assisted in an attempt to save Esther M. Wepking, 23, and Arthur A. Harwood, 23, student, from drowning, Madison, Wisconsin, April 24, 1921. Harwood and Miss Wepking encountered a strong wind and waves 2.5 feet high while in a canoe on Lake Mendota. The canoe capsized three-eighths of a mile from shore, and they clung to it. After a number of young men on shore had refused to go to the rescue, Miss Brennecke and a young man started out in a canoe, and two other canoes, each containing two young men, were also taken to the rescue from points nearby. Each canoe had two or more life preservers. The capsized canoe was reached after the canoes had been paddled a half-mile. Miss Wepking was drawn into Miss Brennecke’s canoe, and Harwood was helped into one of the others. Considering it inadvisable to try to return to shore against the wind, Miss Brennecke and her companions lashed the three canoes side by side, forming a raft, and the raft drifted for 15 minutes, headed with the wind and quartering the waves. Then they attempted to paddle with the wind to the opposite shore, more than a mile distant, but they soon encountered waves four to five feet high, and the canoes shipped water. After Miss Brennecke and her companions had proceeded about two miles and were less than a half-mile from the opposite shore, the raft was struck by a heavy wave and capsized, and the eight occupants were thrown into the water. Miss Wepking was supported briefly by one of the young men, who held to the raft, but he lost his hold several times and was submerged, and Miss Wepking finally let go of him and was drowned. Harwood grabbed a life preserver and drifted away from the raft. Miss Brennecke and two of the young men got hold of life preservers and swam toward shore. One of the young men reached shore, and Miss Brennecke and the other, after swimming 1,000 feet, were rescued 1,000 feet from shore by men in a fishing launch. The three other young men clung to the raft until they were picked up by men in a motorboat, and Harwood was then picked up. 21363-1887
21363 – 1887
21363-1887