Here’s a history-packed and very detailed photo. In the foreground you see James K. Averill and Amsterdam. In the next row back, that’s Urger behind Averill and a boat I can’t identify [name board just to the right of Averill’s stack shows a name that ends in –le No 1 ] behind Amsterdam. Also, in the foreground, there’s good detail of the ratchet and chain system to open the bottom-dumping doors of the scow.
Averill, 50′ x 14′ x 4.5′, was a wooden-hulled tug built in 1912. It worked for a D. G. Roberts of Champlain NY until 1925. Champlain is a town on the NY/QC border. Her original power may have been a 200 hp coal-burning 1905 Skinner & Arnold steam engine. and a Murphy Donnely Co. boiler. She was repowered and given new superstructure in 1930, but I don’t know what the new power or the previous superstructure were. Notations on her info card says her coal storage capacity was seven tons and she burned on average a half ton of coal per eight-hour day.
This dry dock photo shows a “cutaway” of her frames and stringers.
Initially, I looked at this photo and assumed Averill had experienced a catastrophic fire, but with her all-wood structure, a fire would likely not have gone out before entirely consuming the vessel.
Another look at Averill, here off the stern of Tender #3,
says to me that this was the dismantling of Averill, which happened some time after October 1960.
All photos used thanks to the Canal Society of New York. The top photo above appears in Enterprising Waters, by Brad Utter.
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April 14, 2022 at 3:21 pm
William Lafferty
Your unidentified is the steel tug Reliable No. 1, Will, launched 30 July 1898 at Wilmington, Delaware, by Harlan & Hollingsworth, hull number 296, as Gem for the Standard Oil Company of New York, entering documentation on 24 August 1898. 70 x 18 x 8, 62 gross and 28 net tons, twin cylinder steam engine, 12-24 x 14, 350-ihp. It became S. O. Co. Co. No. 11 in 1904 and was sold by Standard 1906 at Philadelphia, renamed William J. Peoples. In April 1907 it came to the lakes via the St. Lawrence for the Niagara Power Company of Buffalo and in 1909 Gem again, owned by the St. Lawrence River Power Company of Ogdensburg, New York. It found its way to Buffalo when the Empire Limestone Company bought it in 1911, renamed Edward L. Fuller, and back east in August 1918 when the Edward J. Barton Lighterage Company bought it, renamed J. Stanley Barton. W. M. Wilms of Buffalo bought it in 1922, renamed it Reliable No. 1 and resold it to the State of New York with the dredge Fort Plain, causing a scandal I won’t go into here. Suffice to say a state investigator claimed Mr. Wilms’s “office appeared to be under his hat,” and that “the Reliable did not live up to to name.” Public Works spent a small fortune in rebuilding the vessels Wilms had claimed were in fine order. The canal folks dismantled the Reliable No. 1 in 1935, and a new Reliable appeared the previous year.
The Averill was officially abandoned in 1962. Johnson’s has its steam plant unchanged, 12 x 12, 50-ihp, its entire career. I suspect the engine was just extensively rebuilt.
April 14, 2022 at 7:07 pm
tugster
Thx again, William. I’d once heard there’d been an earlier Reliable. Can you clarify the sentence that “Johnson’s has its steam plant unchanged.”?
April 15, 2022 at 1:37 pm
William Lafferty
“Johnson’s Steam Vessels,” later “Johnson’s Steam Vessels of the Atlantic, Gulf and Pacific Coats,” later “Johnson’s Steam and Motor Ships,” later “Johnson’ Marine Manual,” and other titles, published by New York naval architect Eads Johnson (best known for his tugs and ferries), 1910 onward. It was an annual listing vessels, their owners and dimensions. Copies are priceless, in my opinion. The earliest I have is 1921, the latest 1956. Johnson passed on in 1961. The Averill’s engine remained the same, at least its dimensions, its entire life, judging by Johnson’s entries.
April 16, 2022 at 11:04 am
tugster
William– Thx for the info. I’ll keep my eyes open for a copy.