Those photos are great! It’s not a big harbor, but there’s a good concentration of stuff there. No job inside the bridge is more than 45 minutes away.

I had HARRIET MORAN’s sister, the SEWELLS POINT, for a number of years. They’re both Combi-tugs – single screw tugs retrofitted with a powerful azimuthing bow thruster. They’re a unique kettle of fish to run – unlike a conventional tug, but unlike a tractor too – because you’re balancing thrust from each end instead of side-to-side. For some reason they built those two with elevated houses; later boats in that series, like DRUM POINT, were built without the extra deck. And CAPE ROMAIN was my last boat, which I gave up in 2005 to move ashore.

Too bad about the Whistling Oyster! But the old clientele *were* the bar, in a sense, so if they’re gone I guess it makes sense that she is, too. Still, an infused cocktail bar! I’m not sure what that is. . . I can just hear Kai ordering one, though. Glad Bertha’s is still the same! Hope to meet you and revisit Bertha’s one day soon, Erik!

Erik, if you read this, I searched on FB but didn’t find Kai – lots of other Kai Hansens, but not “the one.” I’ll try the email address.

I knew your Dad when he was independent, running out of Fells Point, and later on, too, when he worked for Vane. I was a captain for Moran, whose tugs tied up at the Rec Pier in those days. We used to see each other from time to time. One night at the Whistling Oyster I introduced Kai to a young man who was interested in a career in tugs, and I believe he made a trip or two on ATHENA as a fill-in deckhand. And Mark Roesner, mentioned in the City Paper story, was later my mate before going on to work at McAllister as a captain, and finally Vane Bros.

I remember Read, his former Mate and partner in the ATHENA, too. The joke was in our names, mine being Reid – which if you’re a random customer sitting in the Oyster with a few down the hatch, might seem confusing or funny. Read owned the Oyster at that time, and still may.

I haven’t been back to Fells Point in many years, but back then – the 1990s and even the early 2000s, at least while Kai was still around – there was a little nexus down at the foot of Broadway that retained echos of the working days. Between our tugs at the Rec Pier, the ATHENA tied up nearby, and the Square with the Oyster (the last holdout among the old bars), the past still hung on with some of its old swagger. In today’s PC days, where liability rules the roost, a drink is tantamount to a crime, and the tugs long gone – it might be risking some disillusionment to go back. But I still think I’d like to one day.

Thanks for the memories!