By Christopher Sabick, Lake Champlain Maritime Museum
ACUA Institutional Associate Member

2025 marks the 40th year of the Lake Champlain Underwater Historic Dive Preserve System. As one of the first formally established, and state sponsored, shipwreck preserve systems in the United States, Lake Champlain has been at the forefront of providing public access to shipwreck sites in a manner that is protective of the sites and the divers who visit them.

The modern practice of Underwater Archaeology on Lake Champlain began in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s. At this time a group of regional historians, archaeologists and divers formed the Champlain Maritime Society (CMS) whose mission was to “enhance the maritime heritage of the Lake Champlain region through preservation, education, and research.” The CMS conducted some of the earliest archaeological research of shipwrecks sites in Lake Champlain. In Vermont, the question of public access to these resources was an early focal point of discussion which led the Vermont Division for Historic Preservation (VDHP) to open three shipwreck sites to public visitation through the establishment of the Lake Champlain Underwater Historic Dive Preserve System in 1985. This initial group included the steamboat Phoenix, and the canal boats General Butler (Figure 1) and Coal Barge.

Fig. 1 Canal Schooner General Butler, LCMM Collection

This system provided access to the three sites through the establishment of a mooring system at each location with travel lines to the shipwrecks and informational signage.  This system provided improved safety for divers visiting these wreck sites while simultaneously furthering the state’s preservation goals by limiting impacts to the wrecks themselves.  This approach to providing access to previously unavailable resources was met with enthusiasm and cooperation from the dive community.

Through collaboration with the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum (LCMM), established in 1986, the VDHP expanded the preserve system in several phases over the following years. In 1990 two additional sites were added to the system (Diamond Island Stone Boat, Horse Ferry) with two more added in 1997 (O.J. Walker, Champlain II). The small steamboat, later converted to schooner, Water Witch, was added to the system shortly thereafter. In 2003 the Sloop Island Canal Boat was included in the system after two years of archaeological excavation and documentation by LCMM archaeologists. The historic tug US LaVallee was added to the system in 2016, and most recently the Providence Island Canal Sloop and the Pot Ash Point Canal Boat were added in 2024.

Over the course of 40 years of operation the Lake Champlain Historic Dive Preserve System has facilitated thousands of dives, providing safe access to wreck sites that were previously unavailable to the dive community. In recent years access to these sites has not been limited solely to the dive community. Through the use of photogrammetry models of some sites, and through public programming utilizing remotely operated vehicles (ROV), the non-diving public has been able to experience and explore these sites without getting wet.

In addition to providing safe access for divers, the sites included in the preserve system continue to be the subject of archaeological study and documentation (figure 2). There are ongoing efforts to capture a high-resolution 3D model of the entire Phoenix site, a portion of which can be seen in figure 3. A new photogrammetry model of the Horse Ferry was produced in 2024 (figure 4). We have been exploring the possibility of incorporating these sites into ongoing lake science and water quality studies being undertaken by our regional research partners. Another area of future research involves incorporating the local dive community in “citizen science” initiative to help us quantify the rate of environmental and diver impacts to the wrecks included in the system.

Fig. 2 Archaeologist Documenting the Sloop Island Canal Boat, LCMM Collection

Fig. 3 3D Model of the Engine Room of Steamboat Phoenix, LCMM Collection

Fig. 4 3D Model of the Horse Ferry, LCMM Collection

In 2023, VDHP was awarded a National Maritime Heritage Grant from NPS to further work on the canal boats in Vermont waters. A part of this work is to add the wrecks of the Lake Champlain Historic Dive Preserve System, and canal boat wrecks in Vermont Waters to the Vermont Archaeology Inventory (VAI). The VAI is a database established and maintained by VDHP that contains information of historical and archaeological sites in Vermont that can be accessed by archaeologists. By the end of April 2025, LCMM will have added all eleven preserve sites and twenty-seven canal boat wrecks.

In the future we will be considering the continued expansion of the preserve system, with hopes of incorporating sites in the New York waters of Lake Champlain. With 40-years of success to build on the future of public access to submerged cultural resources is full of possibilities.

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