Capt. Henry Bundy

Summary

Capt. Henry Bundy (1826–1906) was a Great Lakes mariner who conducted an evangelistic mission from a succession of gospel ships known in sources as both Good Tidings and Glad Tidings. His Beaver Island work is not merely a later local tradition: the September 13, 1883 Christian Cynosure summarized Bundy’s own report that he had begun a promising Sunday school in one island village and ministered in another.¹

That contemporary report does not name the villages and does not mention the June 10, 1882 casualty marked on the 1978 Historical Map. The exact incident behind the map’s dagger remains unresolved.

Vessels and spelling

The 1883 Christian Cynosure calls Bundy’s gospel ship Good Tidings. A contemporary July 1883 report in the Manistique Pioneer, quoted by the Schoolcraft County Historical Society, calls the new vessel Glad Tidings; Walter Havighurst’s 1945 account uses the latter spelling for the succession of four mission vessels. Both spellings therefore have historical support and should be searchable rather than “correcting” one away.

The Pioneer report says Bundy sold in fall 1882 the craft on which he and his family had sailed for six years, then built a larger vessel during the winter. That chronology does not exclude a grounding, swamping, or recoverable sinking earlier in 1882, but it makes an unrecovered total loss unlikely.

Beaver Island casualty tradition

The 1978 map places “Captain Bundy’s Gospel Ship GOOD TIDINGS” off the northwest shore and follows it with a dagger and June 10, 1882. A later Beaver Island Historical Society lighthouse narrative says Harrison “Tip” Miller rescued Bundy and his family when the gospel ship sank, but gives no date or underlying record. Until a Life-Saving Service journal, lighthouse log, marine casualty report, or contemporary newspaper is found, the date, place, casualty type, rescue details, and vessel identity remain a documented local tradition rather than established facts.

Added 7 August 2026. Recent changes