Uncle Harvey’s Mausoleum, just offshore of Canal Park in Duluth (in the frigid waters of Lake Superior), once consisted of the Icehouse and a cement pillar slightly closer to shore. Originally it was to be a gravel unloading dock, but the wind and waves outside the harbor were too strong for ships to safely use it, and it was abandoned, eventually becoming a popular (though not always safe) structure for jumping off into the lake.

Friends from college used to rig a slack line between pillar and icehouse, attaching the lines to the iron loops and rebar sticking out the top of the pillar. And then they’d attempt—and occasionally succeed—at walking across the line several yards above the icy lake water from the pillar to the structure. Though more often they’d experience an invigorating dip into Lake Superior.

On calm days, the pillar looks like it could be a perfect nesting place for dragons—well out of reach of lurkers in the water, far enough from shore to avoid tourist visitations, and an ideal location to prey on the plethora of seagulls that plague Canal Park . . .

That is, it did, until one cold day during the winter of 2015 when the pillar suddeny vanished. The base finally gave way, and the pillar sank to the bottom of the lake.

No more dragon nesting site.