In the 1920s the crews of S.S. Baychimo set up trading posts in eastern Canada, sailed on fur-trading expeditions to Siberia during the turbulent years of the Russian civil war and made dangerous annual voyages around Alaska to Canada's western Arctic coasts. On each voyage Baychimo had to force her way through heavy ice conditions to re-supply the HBC's remote outposts.

This ship's story had a remarkable twist. Caught in a huge ice floe in 1931  and in danger of being crushed, she had to be abandoned by her crew. Instead of sinking as expected, the gallant ship drifted for a few decades throughout the Arctic, alone and always trapped in her own massive piece of ice. Often seen and occasionally boarded, she became known as the ghost ship of the Arctic.