Wisconsin’s newest meme: A beached boat along Milwaukee’s shoreline

A 33-foot boat called “Deep Thought” was run ashore along the beaches of Milwaukee back in October 2024. 

Since it beached, the boat has become known as the Milwaukee Boat, the S.S. Milwaukee or even just “The Boat.”

It’s caught the heart and attention of Wisconsinites. Crowds of people visit, it’s hosted a a DJ set and someone even wrote a song about it.

Co-founder and editor of Milwaukee Record, Matt Wild, has been keeping watch over the beloved boat. He spoke with “Morning Edition” host Alex Crowe.

This interview has been edited for clarity.

Alex Crowe: Why are so many people drawn to a beached boat in Milwaukee?

Matt Wild: I think they’re drawn to it because it’s just still there. It was ran ashore on Oct. 13 and it’s still there. It’s been there for months, and it slowly built into this thing.

I remember going out there myself a couple days after hearing about it. People were like, “That’s kind of interesting, you know, whatever.” But then as the weeks went on, it was just still there. In the beginning, there was a lot of mystery surrounding the boat.

It’s like, whose boat was this? Why is it still there? Is anyone going to come claim it? Then a lot of reports started coming in, and some of those mysteries and questions were answered. And then just the lore of the boat started building.

Now four plus months into it, it has blown up, and it has become a Milwaukee meme.

AC: Are there any efforts to move this boat, remove it, or is it just going to stay there as a Milwaukee landmark?

MW: There were a few efforts to move it. There was a local towing and salvage company that went out there, I believe twice. I witnessed one of the efforts. It turns out it’s really, really hard to get this boat unstuck from the sand.

All they managed to do was bust a railing on it. The next time they had a little more luck, but they ended up moving it into an even worse position.

So I think at this point they’ve just said, you know, “Forget it. We’re going to let it sit for the winter come spring, come better weather. We’ll try again.”

I’m sure they’ll get it out at some point. I hope they don’t. Because really, this is become my bread and butter here at Milwaukee Record. I can’t get enough of this.

AC: Matt, here in Wisconsin, we have a saying: “Election season never ends.” And that’s true right now. There is a Supreme Court election going on and a lot of people in the state are just exhausted with political commercials and just politics all around. Do you think that that feeds into why people are so excited about something as mundane as a boat being washed ashore?

MW: Well, I can’t speak for the rest of the state, but I can speak for myself. And yes, this is absolutely something I think that’s happening.

I think just before we started talking, I received about 17,000 text messages reminding me to vote. Anytime I sit down in the evening, and the one time I turn on the television set to watch “Jeopardy!” with my family, every commercial is just about the worst commercial you can imagine for the upcoming Supreme Court race.

Just awfulness all around. For me, I think I do look to things like that. Things like “The Boat” or things like the snow pile outside the Marcus Performing Arts Center here in Milwaukee, which we keep track of every year as well, and we place our bets on when the thing is going to melt. This is the kind of hard-hitting journalism people expect from Milwaukee Record.

It keeps me kind of distracted. It keeps me sane. For what it’s worth, I think that kind of coverage and that those kind of stories, it does fill a need. It’s not hard journalism, of course. It’s not politics, of course. But I’m happy to kind of fulfill that role, and Milwaukee Records is happy to fulfill that role.