SS Ithaka was a small freighter, originally built as the Frank A. Augsbury for the Canadian George Hall Coal & Shipping Corporation in 1922. She went on to sail for a variety of different owners, and was renamed Granby in 1927, Parita II in 1948, Valbruna in 1951, Lawrencecliffe Hall in 1952, Federal Explorer in 1955 and finally Ithaka in 1960, before being wrecked on the Canadian coast later that year.