Duluth, Minnesota - September 15, 1999

Lake Superior Magazine today announced the 1999 winner of its annual Lake Superior Magazine Achievement Award. C. Patrick Labadie of Duluth, Michigan, will receive the coveted award. 

“Pat” Labadie has spent a career seeking out, gathering, preserving and protecting vast quantities of Lake Superior maritime history and stories. As director of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Lake Superior Maritime Visitor Center in Duluth, Minnesota, Pat has become an invaluable and oft-tapped resource for the entire lake.

His career started back in his native Detroit at the Dossin Great Lakes Museum, beginning its current era when he was appointed director of the visitor center since just before its construction in 1973. Last year the Duluth visitor center earned Class A status within the Corps, having grown as a focal point for preservation of history and artifacts. 

The Lake Superior Magazine Achievement Award is given to a community, organization or person who has made a lasting contribution to the whole of Lake Superior. In the past, the magazine has given the award to international organizations, cooperating groups, cities and individuals. That an individual’s accomplishments can benefit the lake is personified in Pat Labadie, who 26 years ago organized the now 500-member Lake Superior Marine Museum Association. He has worked for the Detroit Historical Commission and the Saugatuck Marine Museum in Douglas, Michigan, and served as a consultant to the Great Lakes Historical Society in Cleveland, Ohio, the U.S. National Park Service for Isle Royale and Pictured Rocks and the Sleeping Bear Dunes National parks, the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, Michigan Bureau of History, Smithsonian Institution, National Geographic Society, Minnesota Historical Society, Illinois Historic Preservation Agency and Ohio State University.

Editor Paul L. Hayden says, "Patrick’s is a lifetime of building trust among people around Lake Superior and the two surrounding countries. Pat knows whereof he speaks when he speaks about Lake Superior’s maritime history. And if he doesn’t know, he knows who knows and can direct you there. Those 'wood sticks' most fascinate Pat, with pre-Civil War wooden vessels his particular interest."

Pat often spends evenings and weekends collecting artifacts, speaking to groups, instructing divers on underwater archeology or working with environmental protection groups. He spreads the word of preservation and remembrance. Not all of his service has been above water. As a certified diver, Pat has gone below the surface to wreck sites for preservation of the vessels and the story of the sailors who once served them.

In the past, he has received many honors, including being named Great Lakes Historian of the Year by the Marine Historical Society of Detroit, receiving the Ancient Mariner Award from the Marquette (Michigan) Maritime Museum, earning the Presidential Award for contributions to regional history from the St. Louis County (Minnesota) Historical Society, being selected as the North Central Division “Take Pride in America” winner in the individual category and receiving the Corps of Engineers Hiram M. Chittenden Award for Interpretive Excellence. These show his lakewide influence.

"In awarding C. Patrick Labadie the Achievement Award this year," Hayden says, "we know that his lifetime of service will probably not end with his pending retirement in March 2000. However, it is an appropriate time to call attention to a selfless individual whose main desire is to 'get it right' and help others discover the stories about the wood that sticks out of the water."

The award is announced in the latest issue of Lake Superior Magazine, a full-color consumer publication issued six times a year in Duluth, Minnesota. The magazine is available by subscription, at newsstands and from the publisher's office at 325 Lake Avenue South, Suite 600, Duluth, Minnesota 55802. For more information, call 888-BIG LAKE (244-5253).