A car rolls into the harbor during the 1965 trout-season opening

Locator map: Saint James Harbor highlighted within the Beaver Island archipelago — Took place at Saint James HarborLocator plate © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL 1.0); depths NOAA; names USGS GNIS. How the plates are drawn.

Event

Date: circa 1965-05
Kind: Accident
Where: Saint James Harbor
Eras: Modern era
Concepts: maritimetransportationtourismcommunity
Within: Beaver Island

Summary

During the opening of trout season in spring 1965, Bob Winchester’s old Chevrolet rolled down the St. James dock ramp into about thirty feet of water after its brake pedal failed. The Beaver Beacon says diver Don Meggison attached a cable under pack ice and Walt Wojan used a tractor to pull the car out; the vehicle was reportedly running again after being dented.

Evidence and limits

This is a newspaper accident and recovery account, not an insurance claim, damage assessment, dive log, or complete participant record.

Sources

Beaver Beacon, May 1965, “Undertaker Almost Taken Under.”
Reports Bob Winchester’s old Chevrolet rolling down the dock ramp into about thirty feet of water after its brake pedal failed, Don Meggison diving under pack ice to attach a cable, and Walt Wojan pulling the car out with a tractor. The car was reportedly dented but returned to running order; the account does not provide an incident report, damage assessment, or insurance record.
data1 · beaver-island-archive · beaver_beacon · 1965-05_Beaver-Beacon
Beaver Beacon, May 1965, held issue PDF, source scan.
The held eight-page issue scan is paired with the OCR source and confirms the published notice or report; it does not expand the source-specific identity, event, or outcome claims.
data1 · beaver-island-archive · scans · beaver_beacon · issues · 1965-05_Beaver-Beacon

Added 2 August 2026 · revised 3 August 2026. Recent changes

Cite this article

Beaver Island Archive, “A car rolls into the harbor during the 1965 trout-season opening”, https://beaverislandarchive.org/events/beaver-island-dock-car-accident-1965/, accessed [date], citing Beaver Beacon, May 1965, “Undertaker Almost Taken Under.” (and 1 further source listed on the page).

Last revised 2026-08-03. Fill in [date] with the date you read it — this page is static and cannot know that.

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