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That big “300” is beckoning, so although I had other posts planned . . . let’s increment closer to that 300. I’m inviting your participation here so that i can make it the best “non-random” random post. Random Tugs 001 was here. Random Tugs 100 was more than seven years later, and 200 was about four years after that.
What better way to start than with these two photos of W. O. Decker, taken yesterday by Glenn Raymo. Yes, that’s the Walkway over the Hudson. Decker is taking a freshwater cure.
Many previous posts featuring Decker can be seen here.
Kimberly Turecamo assisted an MSC box boat in recently. A less dynamic photo of Kimberly appeared yesterday. The founder of MSC, Gianluigi Aponte, is alive and well in Italy.
Sarah D was on this blog recently with a unique tow; usually she pushes vessels like this. But hey . . . it pays the bills.
Andrea follows a box ship to the NJ portions of the sixth boro.
Reaching back into the archives a bit, here was Honcho in San Juan PR. I took this photo in March 2013. She’s been all around. I’ve forgotten, though, whether she actually worked on the Great Lakes. I need to find out also what she looks like now that she’s a Moran boat.
Back in April 2012, I caught Bruce A. McAllister bringing in Mars, marked as registered in San Francisco. Mars went onto a heavy lift ship over to Nigeria. The photo makes me curious about traveling to Mars.
See the tugboat here? Name the bridge in the background?
Between Algoma Olympic and CSL Laurentian, it’s Leo A. McArthur, built in Penglai China in 2009. Believe it or not, Penglai was the birthplace and boyhood home of Henry Luce, the magazine guy!
Did you recognize the last two photos as the Detroit River, and the bend between Detroit and Windsor. The reason I asked about the bridge . . . the Ambassador Bridge is that the owner died yesterday. Manuel “Matty” Maroun was 93. The 1929-built bridge, as well as the duty-free stores in its vicinity, have been owned by Maroun since 1979.
Many thanks to Glenn for use of the Decker photos. All others by WVD.
The * here denotes these are freshwater ships, plying their trade along what must be the longest peaceful international water boundary in the world, a fact I think deserves to be more widely known and celebrated. Here are installments 1–3.
Radcliffe R. Latimer has appeared here a year ago. For a complete history of the 1978 launched vessel on her third name after a transformative trip to China, click here.
Algoma Mariner is entirely built in China, delivered in 2011. Initially, the forebody was intended for Algoport, a vessel I’d photographed the the Seaway in July 2008, but (to allude to a story told by links here) Algoport sank on its way to China. For more detail of this vessel, let me redirect you again to boatnerd.
The United Way logo here piqued my curiosity, and here’s the answer from corporate Algoma.
Buffalo is US-built and US-registered, a product of Sturgeon Bay WI and launched in 1978.
Bigger isn’t always better, and that’s the genesis of Manitowoc, built to negotiate the rivers around the Great Lakes, waterways where commerce and manufacture still lives inside cities often dismissed as having succumbed to “rust belt” disease. She was launched in 1973 in Lorain OH.
Frontenac is a Canadian built launched in 1968
the the classic “house forward” design.
Coe Leni is the only “salty” in this batch.
Her previous name–Marselisborg–is still visible.
Sam Laud is another Sturgeon Bay WI product, launched in 1974.
Algoma Olympic–named for Canada’s hosting of the games in 1976–was launched that same year.
All photos by Will Van Dorp, who hopes you’re forming an impression of the dynamic economic engine along the international border with our friendly neighbors to our north.
“Motor city” is another name for Detroit, but “detroit” is only part of the name for the waterway given by the French explorer Cadillac when he led the first Europeans to settle “Fort Pontchartrain du Detroit” on a bank of “le détroit du lac Érié,” the strait of Lake Erie), linking Lake Huron and Lake Erie; historically, the strait included the St. Clair River, Lake St. Clair and the Detroit River.
Some time after departing the Cuyahoga, we pass this mysterious site. Any ideas? I’ll identify it at the end of this post.
If you’re not at the helm, straits bring the treat of relatively close passage with other traffic, like Dorothy Ann and Pathfinder here.
Perry’s Victory and International Peace Memorial is a 352′ monument we can all live with, sans controversy.
As we approach the center of the contemporary city of Detroit, traffic and industry intensify. I’d never noticed GLW’s glowing slag heaps, like crafted flows of lava.
On the Windsor side, Frontenac transfers payload . . not sure what. Salt maybe?
On the American side, 1000′ Edwin H. Gott is likely discharging Superior ore or taconite.
Sturgeon Bay-built Sam Laud watches from the Rouge. Laud, the namesake, moved from shop painter and riveter to CEO of GATX.
Folks on the bridge of Algoma Olympic, Port Weller-built and down bound here just south of the Ambassador Bridge, must be experiencing the frustration of having to worry about devil-may-care recreational boaters. Recently, a high profile meeting of stake holders was held at Port Huron to deal with difficult small boat operators, one in particular who decided to play chicken with a freighter .
Last year this China-built tug was called Victorious; now she’s know as Leo A. McArthur, and as then, she pushes hot asphalt contained in John J. Carrick.
Patricia Hoey (built 1949) is a good example of the extended life experienced by freshwater boats.
A McAsphalt unit like Leo A. McDonald, Everlast, matched as always with Norman McLeod, is Japan-built.
I’d love to learn more about this Windsor home, but the name on the facade is that of the Massachusetts-born founder of Canadian Club whisky.
Just north of Belle Isle, SS Ste. Claire, Boblo ferry sister of SS Columbia, marks Kean’s Marina.
And with night falling and work for me to do, we’ll leave this post only partway through the strait with Kaye E. Barker, once Benson Ford III. Notice the GMRenCen in the distance just forward of the front of the self-unloading arm? GMRenCen was built by Ford.
The return of daylight will find us in Lake Huron. To see the St. Clair River by daylight, click here. All photos and sentiments by Will Van Dorp.
The sinuous structures in the top photo depict Cedar Point as seen from a few miles out in the lake.
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