Something Different 74

I have one more LL set, which I’ll post soon, but I first wanted to observe a connection between Eastport ME and Escanaba MI.  Back in April, I was issued travel docs to get to Eastport via Toronto and Saint John NB, which meant a re-entry at St Stephen/Calais.  Since I met up with others at the Saint John airport and we all were crossing in the same van, we were all asked to step into the CBP office for further scrutiny.  Of course, our travel, though circuitous, was legit and we were sent on our way, but that was after some CBP expressed skepticism about a cruise ship being in Eastport.

As it turns out, Eastport, as the deepest eastern US port, it has seen recent cruise ships and was once the 2nd busiest port in the US!  I quote from the second link in the previous sentence:  “

Passengers traveling to and from Boston and Saint John, New Brunswick, came by packed schooners and then crowded steamships, French said. Larger steamships soon made multiple stops in the city each week, carrying hundreds of people at a time. 

In 1876, Eastport launched the North American sardine industry, totaling 18 canning factories along its shores within a decade. The arrival of the railroad to Eastport in 1898 caused the port to further flourish as goods and passengers gained new access to the country’s rail network. As it did, the city’s population reached its peak at just over 5,000. 

Following the invention and spread of the automobile in the early 20th century, the massive steamships fell out of popularity, and in 1933 stopped coming to Eastport altogether.”

For specifics on steamers that once called in Eastport, check this johnwood1946 link.

As I get to the connection between Eastport and Escanaba, let me digress with the next two photos:  it’s Viking Polaris, the newest cruise ship on the Great Lakes, waiting for us to pass at Côte Ste. Catherine in the South Shore Canal portion of the Saint Lawrence Seaway.

Bow above by a friend and stern . . . my photo.

This brings us a week later and over 1000 nm farther west to Escanaba MI and

this warm welcome.

I was told by two unrelated folks in town that we were the first passenger vessel to call in Escanaba in over a half century.  Of course, that triggered me to wonder what the previous vessel was.  The archivist at the local county historical society was very prompt in responding to my Q, writing… “During the later 1940s and the 1950s both SS North American and SS South American made stops in Escanaba.  The boats docked at the municipal dock at that time, and passengers (as many as 400) walked across the park to the old House of Ludington Hotel for lunch, followed by strolling around the city.  I do have photos of one of the boats at the dock.  Many older adults who were young folks at the time remember that the passengers threw coins into the water and kids dove off the dock for them.  (Those stories always give me a ‘third world’ feeling.)”

Phenomenal!  I know of the two American ships and their ignominious end.  It also gave me pause to think we were following in the wake of these two fine vessels produced by GLEW!

Here’s some info about Escanaba’s Sand Point Light, which I’ll be sure to visit later this season.  Another stop will be House of Ludington.  To be acknowledged but now long gone is also Sialia

Many thanks to Karen Lindquist, archivist, for the info about Escanaba and its previous visitors.  

All photos, unless otherwise stated, and any errors, WVD

 

From the Line Locker 37

I spent part of a quiet T’day thinking about doing a 2023 calendar, and difficult as it always is to winnow the choices down to 12 or so shots, I’m doing a calendar.  Price will likely be $20 again.    Sorry to bring up buying on this Black Friday.

Going back through the 2022 photos reminded me of the highs and lows of my personal year.  I also looked again at some gallivant photos I’ve never posted on the blog.  Today seems a good although dark, rainy day to open the line locker. 

Any guesses on this roadside attraction?  It’s a 3/8 size replica measuring 63′ x 13.’  I’ll let you do the math.  Answers below.   Doesn’t the design suggest a Zumwalt class destroyer?

I took the photo in April 2022. 

 

Here’s another roadside attraction.  Maybe I could do some road photos 2022 posts.  Any ideas about this similar replica vessel, this one appropriately on terra firma, or terra mudda?

There’s a clue in this photo. 

So before moving to the next sets, here’s some ID:  both are replica from the Confederate Navy and both are located in North Carolina, whose flag you see above.  The first is CSS Albemarle, moored in the Roanoke River in Plymouth NC.   The actual vessel–158′ x 35′ — was commissioned in April 1864, and sunk in October of the same year.  More here.

The second vessel is CSS Neuse II, a replica of a 152′ x 34′ steam-powered ironclad ram.  Also launched in April 1864, the underpowered and “overdrafted” warship bogged down and never left the immediate area of Kinston NC, where she was built.  Finally, in March 1865, her crew burnt the vessel in the river to prevent its capture by Union land forces.  More here. 

Previous US Civil War vessels I’ve mentioned on this blog are USS Cairo and CSS Hunley.   Any suggestions for other Civil War navies sites to visit?

The fine print on the vessel below says University of Maryland; it’s their RV Rachel Carson down in Solomons MD. 

I took the Carson photo from the decks of skipjack Dee of St Mary’s, a delightful cruise under sail as part of a friend’s even-more-delightful wedding. 

I’m not allowed to say much about the next set, but I have the privilege to see this tricky maneuvering up close.  

Note that this vessel, currently underway between Indonesia and South Korea, is assisted by four tugboats. 

Thanks so much for the hospitality.  You know who you are.  Again, sorry I’m not permitted to say much more or publish my article.  If you have any questions or comments about this last set, email or telephone me.

All photos, any errors, WVD, who’s thinking of doing a freighter cruise soon, with a destination in eastern or southeastern Asia.  does anyone have suggestions?  I’ve not yet contacted these folks.  

1922 Side Wheel Tugboat

Thanks to Jan van der Doe, enjoy these photos of a radschleppdampfer, translated as “side wheel steamer,” a museum ship in Duisburg, Germany.

The side wheel barge tug Oscar Huber was built in Duisburg Ruhrort in 1922. She towed barges until 1966 between Rotterdam and Karlsruhe, about a 300-mile trip on the Rhine. She’s a sole survivor, the only of its kind on the Rhine River saved from scrapping. In 1974 it was turned into a museum.

   

See her in her 1950s b/w glory in this video, with all narration in German. Color video sans narration can be seen here. More video here. 

 

She was recently moved w to a shipyard in Friedrichsfeld–15 miles down the Rhine– as shown here by Herkules IX and Franz Haniel 14.  Both push boats operate for HGK.

 

Note the folded down stacks.

 

Many thanks to Jan for sharing these photos. 

Click here for some posts of Swiss side wheel steamers, photos thanks to Rich Taylor. 

Speaking of HGK and inland river towing, my latest favorite YouTube channel is marktwained, chronicling the work of a Mississippi River captain/pilot.

 

Other Watersheds 12 Redux B

If I have these dates right, Pieter Boele was built in 1893!  Clearly this hull was built for towing, that  bow  not built for pushing.

Of course, the same would be true of the 1913 Jan de Sterke.

Dockyard IX dates from 1915.  I know the small tug is called Furie, considered a push boat.  I can’t make out the name of the third and fourth steam tugs in this photo, beyond the small pusher.

Noordzee is a 1922 tug.

Roek dates from 1930, built in Vlaardingen, my father’s hometown.  He would have been three when it was launched.

Volharding 1 dates from the same year. 

Dockyard V, as seen here, was built in 1942, although the sparse design suggests it’s older than that.

As with part A, all photos in part B here were sent thanks to Jan van der Doe and taken by Leo Schuitemaker.  Scroll through here for some fabulous photos of the event.  Maybe I’ll go back there again in 2024.

Posting by tugster tower robots at the behest of WVD, who wonders why the Dutch are able to field such a rich field of restored and fully functioning steam tugboats.

 

 

Other Watersheds 12 Redux A

Eight years ago, I had the opportunity to go to the steam festival on the waterways in Dordrecht NL.  Here, here, and here are posts that came from that.  That festival has just completed again, and thanks to Jan van der Doe, here are photos of some fine restored circa century-old Dutch steam tugs.

Hercules, for example, is 105 years young and new-build shiny. 

By the way, the tower in the photo below is newer than Hercules.  Info can be found here.

Adelaar dates from 1925, and looks brand new.  The name means “eagle” in Dutch. 

Kapitein Anna, a paddle steamer, entered service in 1911. 

Scheelenkuhlen is German-built from 1927.

Furie is over a century old and looks pristine. Farther out, that’s Dockyard IX, 1942, and Maarten, 1926.

Hugo is from 1929.

Elbe, 1959, spent some time in the US as the mother ship Maryland  for Chesapeake Bay pilots as well as Greenpeace vessel Greenpeace.

All photos sent thanks to Jan van der Doe and taken by Leo Schuitemaker.

Government Tugs Barge Canal 3

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.

 

 

Hudson River Steamers pre-1967 A

Between January and April 1905, Newport News Shipbuilding delivered four 231′ ferries to the Hoboken Ferry Company.  Elmira arrived two months before its better known sister, Binghamton.  Click here to learn why Elmira and Binghamton were called “hand bombers,” and a whole lot more.

Elmira was scrapped in 1983, but I’d guess this photo was taken in the 1950s or even earlier.   I’m not sure of the timing that steam was discontinued.

Look at all the steam tugs and ferries then in the harbor between Manhattan and Hoboken. Maybe someone can more accurately place this photo in time.  Is that a PRR steam tug between Elmira and the Hoboken terminal tower?

Arlington was launched from the Burlee Dry Dock in Port Richmond, Staten Island in November 1903 and entered service in March 1904.  She had two sister, Tuxedo and Goshen, each 224′  loa x 64′ (another source says 206′ x 43′).  Arlington made her last run from Pavonia to Chambers Street in 1958, at the end of over 97 year years of continuous operation for the Pavonia Ferry Company.  “Stories of a Deckhand” by Raymond J. Baxter includes just that from the perspective of someone who worked on this boat.

Thanks to the Canal Society for use of these photos, interesting although connected to the Barge Canal in the same way the sixth boro is.

TS Empire State VI Returns 2021

Welcome back from Summer Sea Term this year.  An FDNY boat provided a water display welcome on the far side of Governors Island, but my vantage point, as suggested by a SUNY grad, was Brooklyn Heights.  This was the view from the Esplanade and Pierrepont.  To see my perspective on previous occasions, click on the tag above.   From the Heights, the overcast and almost precipitating morning dimmed the many gantry cranes in the distant port.

When she was delivered in 1962 as a break bulk freighter SS Oregon, she would have been typical of freighters on the high seas.   Since 1990, returning aboard from summer sea terms has been a rite of passage for thousands of SUNY grads.  I hope I have my dates right;  if not, I’m sure you’ll correct me.

Passing the ferry terminals at the tip of Manhattan must have looked quite different back 30 years ago; the sight from 100 years ago would have differed dramatically. . . 

as would any FDNY or NYPD escort vessels.

Back then, in the foreground, there would be commercial activity and warehouses, not

parkland with

an ever-growing cover of urban forest

almost obscuring the training ship as it passes beneath the Brooklyn Bridge.

Welcome back. 

All photos, WVD, with thanks to Steve Munoz to try out this view.

Another training ship came through here just a week or so ago.   Here are a few more from other maritime academies.

 

 

Prudence

When you see lettering like that, you know it’s either old, or pretending to be.  In the case of this Prudence, it’s the real deal.

All kinds of details can be found in this article, but if you want to hear it from me . . .

She dates from 1911, all wood, built at the Irving Reed Shipyard in Boothbay ME as Madeleine, and is one of less than a handful of “coastal steamers” still extant.

She survived the 1938 hurricane.

In 1921, she was sold from Maine to Bristol RI interests who named her Prudence.  At one time and possibly still, she has rope steering.  That I’d love to see.  Once steam, she was dieselized more than a half century ago.

All photos, WVD.

Retro Sixth Boro (and beyond) 30

In fall 2010, deepening dredging was happening in the sixth boro to prepare for the ULCVs now so commonplace here,  after Panama Canal enlargement and Bayonne Bridge raising. These operations afforded me the chance to see a cutterhead close up.  The crewman wielding the hammer was trying to loosen a worn tooth.   By the way, those teeth weigh 35 pounds each.  Teeth . . .  dentist?

Then as now, Layla Renee was in the dredge support trade.  Right now she’s in Charleston.  She was only two years old at the time of the photo.

It looks that way, but W. O. Decker is NOT a dredge tender in this photo.  Here five people on Decker are catching the stare of the one dredge worker in work vest.

The entire K-Sea fleet has disappeared.  As of 2020, Falcon has become Carol and I’ve not yet seen her latest livery.  Houma was scrapped in 2017 in Baltimore.

Here are two of the McAllister tugs involved in easing MSC’s USNS Sisler (T-AKR 311)into Bayonne drydock as then-John P. Brown manages the door.  For many more photos of the event, check out “floating the door,” where you also see Allied’s Sea Raven, unlabelled.

I caught Growler at Mystic Seaport that fall.  Rumor has it that Growler has returned to the sixth boro under a new name and sans teeth, but is under wraps.

Also in Mystic at that time, 1885 steam/sail vessel Amazon (has nothing to do with Bezos), the 2000 Amistad, and the 1908 steamer Sabino.  Does anyone know the whereabouts of Amazon today?

My reason to be in Mystic that October was to work on Pegasus, seen here with Araminta and Cangarda.  What works of beauty all three are!

Deborah Quinn here is docked near where Jakobson Shipyard used to be located.  I believe that’s her location as of this writing.

Under the old Bayonne bridge, Maurania III assumes position to ease the 1997 Maersk Kokura around Bergen Point.  Maurania III is currently in Wilmington NC.

Back a decade ago, Day Peckinpaugh had some good paint on her, and Frances was like a cocoon in Turecamo livery.  There’s scuttlebutt of a new lease on life for Day Peckinpaugh.

Let’s end with dredging, as we began.  Terrapin Island was one of the regulars in the navigation dredging effort.  Terrapin Island is currently in Norfolk.

All photos, October 2010, by WVD.

Big announcement soon.