This is Alpha, the first-born, when he was 2YO.
This is Beta, the second-born, when he was about 2YO.
This is Gamma, the third-born, when he was about 18MO.
Black Sand
Aug
7
2026
On a recent trip to the UP here in Michigan, we stopped by Whitefish Point. Whitefish Point itself is rather secluded, but it has enough to see that it is a popular place. We toured the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum (which includes the bell from the Edmund Fitzgerald) and an old lighthouse. And then we wandered to the beach, which is mostly sand but has a lot of small rocks too.
The most interesting part about this beach is the line of black sand near the shoreline.
The thing you need to know about Whitefish Point is that it is part of the “graveyard of the Great Lakes” in that it is one of the more treacherous areas and has a large number of shipwrecks. It also happens that many of the shipwrecks are freighters, carrying a variety of things but a common load was iron ore.
Knowing that sand in Michigan isn’t naturally black, and knowing that iron ore is, I told my son (because he was the only one with a magnet) to drag his magnet along the black sand and see what happens.
Sure enough, the black sand stuck to his magnet. Notably, the Edmund Fitzgerald was carrying iron ore on her last voyage, so some of what’s on that beach could be from that cargo.
a land where you will eat food without scarcity, in which you will not lack anything; a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper.
Deuteronomy 8:9
