Old Year 2011

My parents called December 31 “oud jaardag,” if I spelled that right . . . meaning “old year’s day.”  I like the idea of a “look back” day, a last chance to catch up, my opportunity to TRY to catch up on the social part of blogging.  Thanks to all of you who send me fotos from hither and yon, a wealth of images that sometimes overwhelms.  Please continue to do so in 2012, although I can’t always keep up.

Foto below from Rene Keuvelaar from the many steams of the Rhine delta.  Translation is “happy holidays and a great new year.”  Maybe someone can identify the steam tug.

Foto below came from Pam Hepburn of Pegasus Preservation Project.  Foto from 1960 of Pegasus ex-John E. McAllister, assisting in the Newport News launch of Enterprise CVN-65.

Foto below from Jan van der Doe, open cockpit Handyman, Rotterdam harbor, 1941.

Foto from John Watson less than two weeks ago, Charles D. McAllister assisting Centurion out to Mighty Servant 1 for transport to Nigeria.

Foto from Richard Wonder of the supply vessel Twin Tube, a Blount-built harbor boat.

Foto compliments of John Kopke of 36500, the most-rescuing 36′ lifeboat ever, famous for its rescue in February 1952 (the month and year I was born) of crew from tankers Fort Mercer and Pendleton.  Here are some more.

Another oldie from Jan van der doe . . . 1944 foto of Englishman in Rotterdam harbor.

Thanks to Kenneth Bailey . . . Algoma Discovery, 1987-launched laker, heading through the Detroit River less than two weeks ago.

Again, from Ken Bailey, Barbara Andrie, a 1940-launched tug at work on the Detroit River last week.

My foto from yesterday on the Tennessee River, the 1926 steamer-turned hotel-hoping to return to passenger trade . . . Delta Queen.  I’d love to see fotos of her when she worked the West coast and when she traversed the Panama Canal to access the Mississippi waterways.

A mystery tug/pushboat I got a foto of yesterday in Chattanooga.  It seemed to be overseeing several dozen covered barges.

And a foto by my sister . . . she insisted I pose in this foto of the SS William Clay Ford pilot house.  Thanks, sister.

Twelve fotos for old year’s day.  Thanks to all for sending me fotos.  If you sent one and I didn’t use it, either remind me or blame my absence of imagination or my disorganizational skills.  Resolution matters, too;  at least 400k is needed.  If you send a foto, please tell me immediately if I have permission to use it and how to attribute it.

I’m off from Atlanta area to Wilmington, NC and then Newport News in less than 24 hours.  Happy 2012!  Bonne annee.

Meanwhile in the Sixth Boro

Although I have many more “oldcarcity” fotos to share soon, John Watson got the following fotos from his sixth boro cliff yesterday, and they must go up.  Kudos , John!

John’s fotos are physical manifestations of the renaissance of South Street Seaport Museum.  Lightship Ambrose (LV-87), built 1908 . . . a year after  Pegasus, is headed to Caddell’s for some love aka life support.

She made her way across this stretch of the sixth boro escorted

by the gracious Charles D. McAllister.

as well as Elizabeth McAllister.  I can’t identify the smaller boat out front.

Again, thanks much, John.    Here’s a question from a tipster . . . not me! in ny.Curbed.  This is very promising news for the renascent museum; however, like all newborns AND reborns, it needs ongoing support . . . benjamins and members and volunteers.

My last fotos of a lightship in the sixth boro came here exactly two months ago.

Meanwhile, tugster continues a gallivant in the south . . . today off to a high point between Nickajack Lake and Chickamauga Lake.

Unrelated to this post but to one previously, here’s (thanks to Michele) is an interview/TV report from on-board Giulio Verne.

Road Fotos 14

When the road gets long and you see a unique sign like this promising paradise, who

could resist?  This is the terrestrial inland version of the ship graveyard on the Arthur Kill.  This old Packard used a ship’s wheel as decortion.

Ships disintegrate on a mudflat sink into ooze, whereas here trees surge through,

and kudzu carpets.

Post-war automobiles had art deco “figureheads” of all sorts, like this 1950 (?) Pontiac, and

this DeSoto.

Strolling through these north Georgia woods gives hints of a post-petroleum future, a time and place where

archeologists yet-to-be-born might devote years of research and write dissertations on puzzling markers like these.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.  More road fotos . . . soon.

Note:  Old Car City is about two miles off I-75.

Rake

Rake refers to mast slant from perpendicular relative to forward and aft.  Generally, a mast is raked aft of plumb, although in many seas masts are raked forward.  Raking the masts of a sailing vessel, one step of tuning a rig,  ideally serves to balance the center of effort.   The rake here on Liberty Clipper is accentuated by the “perpendicularity” of the buildings over in Jersey City.  Foto taken in October.  Serious sailors and naval architects can talk at length about rake.

Pride of Baltimore II also has seriously

raked masts.  So does Spirit of Bermuda, as seen here back in September.  As do Amistad  and Amazon.

Ditto schooner America.

On power ships, stacks are often raked, although this seems to be  about style.  To rake or not is a “first chicken or first egg” questions of ship design.  Cangarda has a single raked funnel.  Earlier steam vessels appeared to have perpendicular stacks.

Buoys, on the other hand, should not be “raked” this much and on only one side of the channel.  Something amiss here is.

Unrelated:  Some three years back bowsprite took these fotos and gave momentum to my whatzit series.  Here‘s how that “short ship” looks today, just before a radical transformation into something “tall.”

Also unrelated but getting some attention these days, tugster ran this post of Giulio Verne six plus weeks ago.  NYTimes ran this story yesterday, and adds delightful onboard info.

I’m still in Georgia, craving salt water, completing unfinished blog posts when the spirit moves me.

Tale of Two Hulls 3

Being somewhat bored in rainy inland Georgia this morning, I thought to look through my drafts and found this . . . unfinished . . . from almost a year ago.  Enjoy.  Two years ago, I compared schooner hulls.  Be forewarned . . . some poignant fotos are here.

This hull reminds me of a streamlined and vibrant animal.  Can you guess it?

It’s Ellen S. Bouchard, launched 1982, 104′ loa x 35′ x 14′.

The next two fotos show the hull of Phillip T. Feeney, built 1892 . . . for as long as I can remember abandoned and disintegrating near the Port Richmond ferry landing.  I wrote about her here, and

Citynoise shimmied aboard her here.  Phillip will never again float, whereas

here’s Ellen S.  Check out the lower Manhattan skyline in the background and the absence of the towering 1 WTC. Cheers from away.  I’m surrounded by Georgia pine at the moment.  And come to think of it, what these two vessels do for the sixth boro is accomplished in upland Georgia by vibrant trees growing from the same ground and housing one type of life where old needles carpet the woods floor and fallen trees furnish it for others.

Unrelated:  houseboat living . . .

Road Fotos 13

Update:  May Day no more at South Street Seaport Museum, and I have sent my benjamins as promised.    As I understand it, the Museum has been “taken over” in some fashion by the Museum of the City of New York.     Below, Peter Stanford addressed a group of “save our seaport” supporters back in May.

Bravo to Save our Seaport for their efforts to pull together support.

Guess what this is?  A clue is this:  I took the foto back in November in Detroit.

This is related.  The Great Lakes are mostly devoid of commercial passenger traffic today, but a century ago, had my great-great grandparents lived and prospered along the “northern coast” of the US, deluxe cruise itineraries might include stops at Buffalo, Cleveland, Detroit.

Here, from the Dossin Museum is a model of what was marketed as THE way to cruise the Great Lakes around the time I was born.  Even the name of the aqua-hulled vessel,

SS Aquarama exudes that age of optimism.  Too bad I hadn’t  started this blog and contracted my obsession a decade or more earlier . . .  I would have been able to photograph her in mothballs in Buffalo.   Although it’s better late than never, when “stuff gets gone, it’s gone.”

So here’s the answer to my “whatzit” question . . . that place of carved oak above is the lounge on one of those Great Lakes passenger vessels:  City of Detroit III.  Who knows what honetmooners, retirees, or other celebrants smoked cigarettes (back when that was thought sophisticated)  and sipped drinks here.

Among the many great people I met this past year was Peter Boucher of Nautical Log.  Peter sent me this foto in response to a foto of Cove Isle, here.  Peter’s explanation of the foto below is as follows:  “When we were on the 1967 Western Arctic Patrol in CCGS Camsell  at one of the river stops this CCG river vessel came out to visit us.  Our Captain renamed it “Dimwit”, as it looked like it was going to turn over at any moment.”  Here’s another shot of Dumit.

I had to include this foto here:  this endless coal train travels along the bottom of the Great Lake called “Lake Maumee.”  Never heard of it?  It was there, though.  The day before Thanksgiving I waited a long time as this slow train moved prehistoric plant material along the bed of this prehistoric lake.

I also had the pleasure of meeting Jed this past year.  Thanks much for the tour of the Jacksonville area.

Blue Marlin captivated me this year, to put it mildly.  Here Clearwater, another worthy project if you’re still toying with year-end donations,  checks it out.

Here’s a foto from January 1, 2011:  Ann Moran glides on clouds beneath a heavenly bridge in charleston, SC.

Finally, it’s a cliche to end with a sunset pic, maybe, but I am so glad that a “cancelled trip” led me to visit Vieques as Plan B.  I’m hoping for more “plan b or even c” gallivants for 2012.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.  I hope to write again from Wilmington, NC.

Two Hours on the KVK 2: Winter Solstice 2011

Here’s my post from a year ago. Where HAS the time gone?  A joy of doing this blog is to go back, and sometimes as with this one, my memory–or is it my gut–recalls the eagerness of that morning 365 days ago.  What I pursued then I still pursue  . . .

Can you spot anything in the foto below that suggests the time of year?  Answer follows.  All fotos look better if you enlarge by doubleclicking on them.

Oyster Creek reenacts a moment with the Bayonne Bridge that mimics a Fractor scene (see my “masthead” atop each post) from five years back.

L. W. Caddell struts out into the KVK all in a day’s work that

shows off its bollard pull.

Mary Alice (ex-Gulf Sword, 1974) sashays back to the work on the channel near Shooters.  I wonder, given how long the deepening of  the sixth boro channels has been ongoing and how from the surface, the water looks unchanged, has anyone heard of a moniker for this project akin to “big dig,”  a Boston phenomenon?

Behemoths like NYK Romulus, relatively small given the world fleet, benefits from this dredging.  Notice the red/green detail nearly in the center of this foto.  Might that be on-deck controls for a bow thruster?

In her last moments of this leg of her never-ending journey, she’s assisted by Gramma Lee T Moran and

Margaret Moran.  Without the dredging and without assistance, Romulus would never get here and

negotiate this

S-curve.  Notice in the distance, where on Shooters shore the dredging currently focuses.  If you missed this post showing Shooters a century ago, click here.  If you want a comparison then and now, click here.

So, did you find the seasonal reference in the top foto?  Here’s another look . . . move your eye toward the bell in front of Amy Moran‘s  raised wheelhouse.  Piney branches.  I like it.  And I’m thrilled to see Ice Babe Base back in town.

Parting shot for this solstice:  from left to right, Barney Turecamo, Amy Moran, and Turecamo Boys Girls (Thanks, Harold!).

Saturday I hit the road for the south, Chattahoochee watershed, then Cape Fear, then maybe Newport News.  Tomorrow I may put up some road fotos not yet used from the last trip.

Thanks for reading.  Peace,  friendship, prosperity, and imagination to all of you.    Health too.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp, today. . . . first day of winter . . . 63 degrees in the sixth boro!

Random Traffic December 2011

Thomas D. Witte . . . I did nothing to manipulate this image, no liquification, no DAP . . .

Yet another Mighty Servant 1 foto with four movers of the Miller’s Launch fleet.    As of this writing, the Mighty is still anchored at the Narrows.  Bravo on what appears to have been a flawless loading.

Gustav Schulte passes the loading on a very slow bell, partly because of the tow happening off its port bow also.

I’m not sure what this tow is . . . Sea Lion (?) and a thousand feet tailing it.  The tail boat may be Iron Wolf.    Can anyone help?

December means fishing on the sixth boro . . . here’s a newcomer for me . . . Mary Virginia (ex-Maazee).

Irish Sea moves a barge into the Bay.

Eagle Baltimore and Liechtenstein swing on the hook.

Crystal Cutler does too.

Shearwater motors out the east end of KVK headed, I believe, for North Cove.

Crystal Marie exits the Narrows.

Happy last day of Fall 2011.

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.  And this just in . . . as of noon today, Mighty Servant 1 exited the Bay Nigeria-bound.  I hope the good folks on Meagan Ann get a foto they will share.

Ice and Fire

There’s a link a bit later to a post from last winter.    I hope you check it.  For now I’ll say Robert Frost was on the money here.

Yes, it’s Kristin Poling, embracing her future.

Here’s what Robert Frost wrote, as a paraphrase of Dante Alighieri:         “Some say the world will end in fire,    Some say in ice.          From what I’ve tasted of desire       I hold with those who favor fire.           But if it had to perish twice,        I think I know enough of hate             To say that for destruction ice           Is also great                        And would suffice.”

Note the house, removed and on the bank.  Here’s the fotos of the ice NOT sufficing to destroy  Kristin 11 months ago.    Here are some fotos from my visit on her two months ago.

Many many thanks to Bob Silva for these fotos, which he took yesterday.    RIP,  (recycling into productivity) Kristin Poling, December 15, 1934—Dec 15, 2011.

Mighty Servant Packed

at least from what I could see, Mighty Servant 1 is packed,

all deck space is taken,

cargo is lashed and ready for travel.

Some ride the seas in a limo like the QM2 in the distance, while others

ride the pickup bed . . . or the roof racks, and catch the spray.

Here’s how she looked just eight days ago.

Buon viaggio, whenever it begins.  Or maybe rather than Italian, I should use Nigerian pidgin English:  Waka fain!

All fotos by Will Van Dorp.