The wreck of the James R. Bentley, a 170-foot-long schooner, has sat 165 feet beneath the surface of Lake Huron since 1878. Within its hold was an unlikely treasure.
The quest to retrieve the prized cache stored in the Bentley brought together a rescue team on a sunny September morning.
If their dive was successful, the group would be bringing up not gold, jewels or other archetypal shipwreck loot. Instead, it was aiming to retrieve a few scoops of 145-year-old rye seeds.
The dive had been sponsored by Chad Munger, the founder of Mammoth Distilling, which produces spirits in Northern Michigan. For him, these rye seeds held the promise of local flavor that might help set his whiskey apart. For Eric Olson, a botanist who runs a lab at Michigan State University, the seeds contained hidden botanical information that could shed light on past farming in Michigan. To the divers and shipwreck experts on the expedition, they offered the chance to interact with a beloved trove of history much more closely than is normally possible.
Many possibilities might grow from these small seeds, especially if they could actually be made to sprout. But first, they had to be brought to the surface.
Hooked on Rye
Shipwrecks in the Great Lakes are “one of America’s best-kept secrets,” said Ross Richardson, an author and historian who helped spur the Bentley dive.
He estimates that 4,000 lie under the lakes, with a quarter of them still undiscovered. A small community of enthusiasts studies and documents these shipwrecks, many of which are “in pristine condition,” Mr. Richardson said. They also search for new ones: He found a highly sought-after wreck, the Westmoreland, in 2010.
Mr. Munger, the distillery founder, has a similar questing spirit. He seeks opportunities to support local growers and to make his offerings stand out. Some of the whiskey from his craft distillery is made with Rosen rye, a historic varietal beloved by bootleggers during Prohibition that disappeared from Michigan’s fields until he began planting it again in 2020. Since the success of that project, Mr. Munger said, “we’re hooked on rye” — which, along with the wood it’s aged in, provides whiskey with its flavor.
Years ago, Mr. Richardson and Mr. Munger began discussing the possibility of making another historically inflected whiskey, using wood brought up from the wreck of the Westmoreland. But that shipwreck, like most, is state property, and can’t be disturbed without a permit.
But the wreck of the Bentley belongs to Paul Ehorn, another expert on Great Lakes shipwrecks, and Mr. Richardson wondered if Mr. Munger might be open to using its wood instead. He showed Mr. Munger an old news clipping about the ship that detailed its sinking, the successful rescue of its crew and its cargo: 36,000 bushels of rye.
“That wood is really interesting,” Mr. Munger recalled saying. “But you know what’s way more interesting? Rye!” Mr. Munger and Mr. Ehorn struck a deal, and they all began to brainstorm how best to retrieve the seeds.
Good Old Boys
Around 9:30 a.m. on Sept. 17, two dive boats cast off from the launch at Hammond Bay. They carried Mr. Munger, Mr. Richardson and Mr. Ehorn, who were joined by two technical divers, Bruce Bittner and Dusty Klifman. They cruised for about five miles, and then tied off just above the Bentley, which sits 165 feet beneath the water’s surface, stuck in silt.
“It was just us, for miles and miles of open Lake Huron,” Mr. Munger said.
Soon, Mr. Klifman pulled on his drysuit and fins, grabbed his rebreather and eased off the boat into Lake Huron. He pulled himself hand over hand along the dive line. Forty-five feet down, he remembered, “I feel the cold — the first temperature change.” He kept hauling himself deeper.
This chilly and oxygen-free environment helps to preserve Lake Huron’s shipwrecks, along with whatever is inside. Mr. Klifman has explored wrecks that still have intact glass in their windows or dishes stacked in the galley shelves.
The team hoped the seeds would be in similar shape.
Anticipating the dark and silty water that awaited them, Mr. Klifman and Mr. Bittner had choreographed their movements ahead of time. When they reached the Bentley, Mr. Bittner handed Mr. Klifman a large, syringe-like sampling tube, which Mr. Richardson had designed for the job. Mr. Klifman plunged the tube into the hold.
When he pulled it out, “I could see blond grain,” Mr. Klifman said. “I thought, holy cow, this stuff is still good.” He then filled a second tube, and he and Mr. Bittner began the slow journey back to the surface.
Mr. Klifman, who has been diving since age 13, has made hundreds of trips down into the Great Lakes. The Abandoned Shipwreck Act, passed in 1988, generally prevents him from bringing anything back. (Instead, he shares photos and videos on his social media pages.) The opportunity to carry something out of the depths was “a very special situation,” he said. “A rare thing.”
The Jurassic Park Method
By 12:30 p.m., the team was back at the launch. Mr. Munger popped the trunk of his van and placed the seeds on ice. Then he gunned it to Michigan State University in East Lansing, where Dr. Olson was waiting to crack open the capsules in his botany lab.
Mr. Olson poured the rye out into a cheesecloth-lined sieve. After a century and a half in the water, all of it smelled “profoundly bad,” Mr. Munger said. But blackened, mushy grain commingled with seeds that had kept their color and shape. They began picking out the healthiest-looking kernels.
Dr. Olson, whose specialty is wheat breeding, last collaborated with Mr. Munger on the Rosen rye revival, propagating a small handful of grain they obtained from a Department of Agriculture gene bank. (Mr. Munger funds both projects.) Many of these seeds he studies are deep in dormancy — a state that allows them to survive difficult conditions, but prevents them from germinating.
“We generally have to wake them up a bit to work with them,” Dr. Olson said.
The Bentley seeds are the oldest Dr. Olson has ever worked with, and he spent weeks trying to resuscitate them. Some he dried out, and then soaked in a hormone solution. Others he placed in cold storage, to provide a gentler adjustment to life outside the lake. Most he gave water and light and left to their own devices.
Sadly, none of the shipwrecked rye would sprout. “We’re not able to get plants,” Dr. Olson said.
But he did obtain genetic material from the seeds, which could help to determine their provenance and variety. His lab may also try to introduce portions of this rye’s genome into a modern variety using gene editing, which he compared to “the Jurassic Park method.”
Dr. Olson said even an altered form of this grain may have traits modern plant breeding has massaged out of our crops. “It’s a piece of agricultural history that we’re able to bring back,” he said.
Mr. Munger wants to taste the altered rye. Until then he’ll be out there searching for his next time-traveling grain.
“We’re looking at every historical corner that we can find,” he said. “We’re turning over every rock.”
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