The USCGC Sundew was built by Duluth’s Marine Iron and Shipbuilding Company and was launched on Feb. 8, 1944. This Coast Guard cutter was a sea-going buoy tender — in other words, a ship used to maintain and replace navigational buoys like the ones you see in our harbor — and was reinforced to allow it to break the ice that forms on the Great Lakes in winter. 

 

The Sundew is named for the carnivorous “flypaper” plant that traps prey in sticky hairs on their leaves. But it shares little in common with the plant it’s named for. In fact, in 1958, the Sundew helped rescue two survivors of the Carl D. Bradley when it sank on Lake Michigan. It didn’t even try to eat them. The Sundew was finally decommissioned and retired on May 27, 2004. When not docked outside Pier B for guests to view, the private owners take the Sundew out on the lake for leisure.