Document (PDF)
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
NOVEMBER • DECEMBER, 2000 Volume XLVIII; Number 6 MEMBERSHIP NOTES • Apologies from the Editor for accidently switching the May-June Seaway News with the July-August Seaway News in the last issue of Telescope. You will find the missing May-June Seaway News in this issue. CALENDAR OF EVENTS Feb. 10-18 Detroit Boat Show at Cobo Hall - We’ll be there! Stop by andVisit our exhibit. Mar. 3 Movies on the wide screen from 10:00 - 4:00 — Special showing of the Blessing of the Fleet Ceremony at Mariners Church in Detroit. Free with paid admission to the Dossin Museum Mar. 17 G.L.M.I. Entertainment meeting 12:00 - 3:00 Hydroplane Racing Movies. Free with paid admission to the Dossin Museum. Apr. 6 Opening of the Ship In A Bottle Exhibit - An eclectic collection of Great Lakes and other boats in bottles will be on display in DeRoy Hall. For everyone who marvels at the intricate work inside a glass bottle, this is your chance to inspect more than two dozen pieces of art. Apr. 7 Movies on the wide screen from 10:00 - 4:00 - Special showing of the History of the U.S. Lake Survey. Free with paid admission to the Dossin Museum. Apr. 28 Fit Out Party - Come and learn how to produce a boat in a bottle as members of the International Ship in Bottle Collectors meet and discuss how they produce these pieces of art. Sessions all day in DeRoy Hall. May 5 Opening of the new exhibit - Frontier Metropolis. A look at The City of the Straits - Detroit as it was recorded in pencil sketches, watercolors, and oil paintings prior to the 1830's. Maps, navigation charts, portraits, and sketches of the landscape before the camera was invented. May 5 Belle Isle Clean Up Day - Come out and help to show that you care about our 1,000 acre park in the middle of the Detroit River. May 5 Movies on the wide screen from 11:00 - 4:00 - Special showing of Belle Isle-A Portrait in Time, the history of Detroit's public park. Free with paid admission to the Dossin Museum. CONTENTS • Tug GENERAL Raised After Lying On Bottom For Nine Years.................................................................... 143 Putting It First - My PUT-IN-BAY T r i p ..................................................................................................................145 2000-2001 Winter Lay -up L ist ............................................................................................................................ 149 Great Lakes & Seaway News...................................................................................................................................154 OUR COVER PICTURE . The GREAT LAKES TRADER was built at the Halter Marine Shipyard in New Orleans and entered the St. Lawrence Seaway in June, 2000. The barge measures 740 feet by 78 feet and when being pushed by the tug JOYCE L. VAN ENKEVORT, the total length is 844 feet. The self-unloading barge has a capacity of 40,000 tons. This photo was taken by Rod Burdick on June 21,2000 when the barge was at Escanaba, Michigan scheduled to load ore for delivery to Indiana Harbor. Telescope© is produced with assistance from the Dossin Great Lakes Museum, an agency of the Historical Department of the City of Detroit. Visit our Website at: http://www.glmi.org Published at Detroit, Michigan by the GREAT LAKES MARITIME INSTITUTE ©All rights reserved. Printed in the United States by Macomb Printing, Inc. NOVEMBER • DECEMBER, 2000 Page 143 T\ig GENERAL Raised... After Lying On Bottom For Nine Years Reprinted from Marine Review July, 1919 After lying on the bottom of Mud Lake for nine The wreck was located last winter by sounding years, in fifty-four feet of water, with her hull buried through the ice, after which the preliminary operations in seventeen feet of mud, the wooden tugboat to raise her were begun. Following a carefully worked GENERAL has been raised. The work was out plan, all connections were removed from the boiler accomplished by T. L. Durocher, a contractor of Sault by divers and braces were placed across the hull and Ste. Marie, Michigan, who specializes in towing, also along the break. The work was then discontinued lightering and wrecking. The GENERAL, which was until spring. owned by the Great Lakes Towing Company, was The vessel was raised by the lighter SAINTE sunk in a collision with the Canadian Pacific steamer MARIE, which is 302 feet long with 53-foot beam ATHABASCA on November 30,1910, and for many and equipped with derricks at each end. These derricks years has been regarded as a total loss. are 60 feet high and are equipped with 91 and 99-foot The GENERAL is 97 1/2 feet long, 24 feet beam steel booms respectively. They have a lifting capacity and 10 feet deep. She was built at Bay City, Michigan of sixty tons each. in 1900. She is powered with a high-pressure, double After the SAINTE MARIE was in position over upright engine with cylinders 22-inch bore x 24-inch the wreck, the boiler was removed first. Divers stroke. She carries one double firebox boiler, 11x14 descended and passed slings, made of steel cable, feet. Her gross tonnage is 132. under the boiler. The slings were connected to a 7- Unusual interest is attached to the raising of the purchase tackle on one of the derrick booms and the GENERAL, due to the fact that she had settled so boiler brought to the surface and slung aboard the deeply in the mud, which always makes a difficult lighter. During this operation, the lighter was bottom for divers to work upon. In the opinion of counterweighted with rock deck ballast to keep her several wreckers, according to Mr. Durocher, it was on an even keel. As the boiler came up, part of the impossible to raise her. house and the funnel came with it. The vessel had gradually settled in the soft The next operation was to dig six deep holes, bottom of Mud Lake, resting on her starboard side three on each side of the wreck. These were carried until the top of her rail was just level with the bottom from fifteen to twenty feet below the boat. Then by of the lake. employing jets of water at high pressure, the holes Boiler, stack and house A sling was passed around Swinging the GENERAL'S boiler coming out of the water. the boiler for raising it. aboard the SAINTE MARIE TELESCOPE Page 144 were connected by tunnels. Next three heavy slings were placed under the vessel. One was located just forward of the wheelhouse, another just forward of the engine, but aft of the break in the hull, and one under the propeller shaft at the stern. Then the forward and aft slings were connected to the lighter's derricks. The center sling was connected to a set of 7-sheave blocks rove with fifteen parts of one-inch steel wire cable. The lighter was counterweighted with the GENERAL'S boiler and five hundred tons of rock deck ballast. Hoisting was begun at 7:30 a.m., and an hour later the hull was clear of the bottom and within twelve feet of the surface of the lake. At this Deck nearly awash just juncture, the tackles were block and block. Then The hull well afloat with the before putting the pumps freeing it of water. patch in place. the wreck was towed five miles below Mud Lake Hull of the tug GENERAL after raising is shown at the left - the lighter SAINTE MARIE is shown counterbalanced against the lift with 500 tons of rock and the tug's boiler - raising purchase was through 7-sheave blocks - the illustration at the right shows the GENERAL after raising, patching and pumping out. to clear water. The muddy water had hindered the work materially as it made it almost impossible for the divers to see to work below the surface. The hull was allowed to rest in thirty feet of water while the slings were shortened and the patch for the hull prepared. Then the hull was brought to the surface, the patch placed in position and the pumping operation begun. It was also necessary to remove sixty tons of coal and about three feet of mud from the hold of the vessel. The wreck, after being pumped out, was towed to Detour, Michigan. The wrecking operations were carried out under the direct supervision of W.W. Durocher while the underwater work was in charge of William McCoy. Postscript: The GENERAL was After lying on the river bottom since November 30, 1910, the repaired and sold to T.L. Durocher. GENERAL was repaired and is shown here as part of the Durocher fleet. NOVEMBER • DECEMBER, 2000 Page 145 PUTTING IT FIRST My Put-in-Bay Trip by A1 M ann 6/10/2000 It has been said many times, "the first is usually the best." During my life long interest in marine history, I have enjoyed the TICKETS opportunity to travel aboard a variety of conveyances. Amongst GOING FAST those include: the Georgian Bay Lines gleaming white dream ship, SOUTH AMERICAN; the gigantic S.S. NORWAY; MISSISSIPPI QUEEN; the CAYUGA streaking across Lake FOR THE BIG Ontario; a Normac trip from Wallaceburg to Toronto; a memorable 11 day return; tug boat adventure from Sarnia to Sept. lies, Quebec; yes, the wonderful Bob-Lo steamers; a few that have created MOONLIGHT important entries in my marine memory log. Yet, one vessel that provided a full day of cruising back in 1951 sticks out prominently Dancing Atmard Ship as a special adventure, not only because of it being one of my first All Aboard at H |'.,M. trips, but because of the once in a lifetime opportunity and its and tin- uniqueness.