Allan “Butch” James Klopp

“Butch” (nobody ever referred to him by any other name) Klopp was born in 1944 in Port Washington, WI and lived most of his life in the house he was born. Butch made his first dive in the fall of 1965 on the wreck of the steam screw TOLEDO, which sank in 1856 off Port Washington, Wisconsin. He reached the wreck by swimming from shore. His son Jason said that his dad found a gold chain on the wreck and “got bit pretty bad” by the shipwreck diving bug.  This was the start of Butch’s wreck diving hobby that spanned 22 years and up to 100 different shipwrecks.  Over 60% of these wrecks were in southeastern Wisconsin along the western coast of Lake Michigan.  Butch passionately enjoyed seeing something that no one had ever seen. He often dove in the winter, when the Lake had better visibility.  Of course, the water at this time of the year was extremely cold in Lake Michigan!

Butch found shipwrecks using similar methods as other pioneer wreck hunters.  They spent countless hours researching archives and libraries looking for clues about where the ships had gone down.  Then they talked to the experts that didn’t dive at all: commercial fisherman.  The local knowledge and sharp memories of these fisherman led to much of the success of the early wreck divers.  Fisherman know their area of the Lake intimately and never forget where they snagged a large object on the bottom with their nets or other fishing gear.  Upon further underwater inspection by the diver, this object turned out to be a…shipwreck!

On April 29, 1988, President Ronald Reagan signed the Abandoned Shipwrecks Act of 1987 into law.  The law states that any wreck that lies in a state’s submerged land is property of the state if the wreck is determined to be abandoned.   Before this time, the rule among divers was that the first diver to discover a wreck could recover any artifacts from it before telling other divers about the discovery.  As a result, many divers had collected large collections of artifacts before the law was enacted.  So, in addition to discovering many shipwrecks, Butch conserved roughly 10,000 artifacts from the ships.  These artifacts are known as “The Klopp Shipwreck Collection” and were recovered from 41 shipwrecks all over the Great Lakes. After Butch Klopp’s passing, in 2022 his family donated the collection to the Wisconsin Maritime Museum in Manitowoc, Wisconsin. This doubled the size of artifacts in the Museum’s possession and ensures the collection remains intact for public education. Some of the more unique artifacts include a loaded revolver, a glass fire extinguisher, and even a preserved “crock cheese”.  Butch was known to eat the pickles and cheese from crocks that he found on wrecks.