William Oscar (W. O.) Decker, the restored tugboat operated by South Street Seaport, is available for charter. I wrote about it here last year. We crossed paths in Kingston Memorial weekend Saturday night. Here she’s docked beside Mathilda, shorepiece of Hudson River Maritime Museum in Kingston, NY.

Mathilda dates from 1898; Decker from 1930. Both originally used steam power; Mathilda was never converted. Other connections between Mathilda and Decker . . . at South Street Seaport exist.

Decker slipped out of Rondout Creek with little more than a horn blast Sunday morning. I heard no line commands.

I recently saw an issue of Lekko, whose website I urge you to check out. The explanation I got for the title is this: “Lekko” is the spelling of the line command Dutch dock workers (my ancestors) “heard” as English sailors were leaving the dock. Maybe there’s another magazine called “kastof.”

To round out this post, here’s Crow headed north off Yonkers. Mathilda, Decker, and Crow–built 1963 in Brooklyn–are each spaced about a human generation apart.

Crow works for Port Albany Ventures, owner also of the mystery tug in Random Tugs 17, identified by Harold E. Tartell, who also supplied the close-up below, as Herbert P. Brake. Check out this link to learn of Mr. Brake and materials he used to construct this push boat. More on Brake in this really interesting blog.

This is a post that wants to go on and on. Alice, for example, is in Marseille. Yeah! and I”m outa the sixth boro and may/may not post from the Ohio River. On verra.