Steamboats

  In October of 1811 the first Steamboat started down the Ohio River from Pittsburgh. Called the New Orleans it was captained by Nicholas J. Roosevelt the brother of Theodore Roosevelt's great grandfather. It made it to New Orleans but it's draft proved to be too deep for the Ohio River. (The Mississippi was deep enough for it to operate there). The New Orleans sank in July of 1814 when it struck a submerged tree snag. 

New Orleans replica

   The non-postcard image above shows a replica of the New Orleans that was built in 1911 for the centennial celebration of the momentous event.
   In 1816 Captain Henry M. Shreve piloted the first mechanically successful steamboat down the Ohio by placing the engines on deck. This permitted the George Washington to take the minimum draft necessary to clear the bottom of the Ohio River. It was capable of carrying 200 tons of cargo.
   There are those who claim Captain Shreve was the person who cut his cabin up into small rooms and hit upon the idea of naming them after the states in the union, hence the name they are now called around the world, staterooms. Another version states that Nicholas Roosevelt  built the  luxurious steamboat George Washington in the 1830s. This steamer contained 26  rooms and since there were 26 states in the union at that time each room was given the name of a state. All rooms are numbered now but are still called staterooms.
  In 1841 the cost to build a steamboat was an average of $35,000, with a daily running expense of about $200.00. A trip from Cincinnati to New Orleans and back took about 20 days. Very large cargoes were taken down river by steamboats towing the dismantled hulls of old boats. Thus the beginnings of the "tow" of today. By the way a barge is never towed it is pushed so it should be called a pushboat, but of course it never will. Sternwheelers were better barge pushers and displaced the sidewheelers.
  The majority of boats you see here are what were called packet boats. These were Steamboats that ferried passengers to specific destinations and returned. Their departure and arrival times were so accurate that they were contracted to carry the mail, thus the term mail boat was used interchangeably with packet boat.
  Some steamboat disasters, a list of some of the packet lines plus a more complete history of events on the Ohio will be found on the next page.

   The non-postcard drawing above shows what some of the parts of a steamboat are called.

    In 1901 Albert Otto Kraemer started what would become the most prolific postcard business in this part of the country, Kraemer Postcards. He is shown on the right in one of his postcards called "Good by" Off for a trip on the Ohio.

DELTA  QUEEN

  The Delta Queen and her identical sister ship the Delta King - nicknamed the million dollar boats - were fabricated from 1924 to 1927 on the River Clyde at the Isherwood Yard in Glasgow, Scotland and assembled at Banner Island shipyard in Stockton, California. Their nickname was not far off the mark as each boat cost $850,000 after the cost of furnishings were added to the actual construction costs.  This is compared to the average cost of $75,000 for other boats being built on the Ohio River. The boats were completed on May 20, 1927. Both boats ran between San Francisco and  Sacramento on the so called "Delta Route", the Sacramento - San Joaquin River Delta, which gave them their names. Both boats ran their last runs  on the last day of the Golden Gate International Exposition or World Fair on Treasure Island, September 29, 1940.
   They ferried troops from San Francisco to troop ships until the fall of 1941 when they were returned to Stockton and were sold to the Isbrandsten Steamship Co. of New York. Both boats were to be towed to the East Coast via the Panama Canal and used as excursion boats on the Hudson River. World War II put an end to that idea. The Navy rushed both boats back into service as emergency hospital transports. Their classification was Yard House Boats, the King was YHB-6 and the Queen as YHB-7. On July 5, 1944 they were reclassified as Yard Ferry Boats, the King was YFB-55 and the Queen was YFB-56. Below you can see the battleship gray YFB-56 ferrying troops.

   From April 25 to June 26, 1945 the Delta Queen took the delegates of the 51 countries that were present for the founding conference of the United Nations on sightseeing trips around San Francisco Bay. Both boats went into the "mothball fleet" in 1946. The King was removed from the Navy records on April 17, 1946, the Queen was removed on August 28.

   The Delta King (right) and the Delta Queen (left) are pictured docked at the Stockton (California) channel, ready to take their places from their predecessors, the Fort Sutter and the Capital City, in the overnight passenger service between Sacramento and San Francisco. (not a postcard)

^{If you would like to see the fate of the Delta King}

   The Delta Queen was Purchased by Tom Greene in 1946 and was towed thru the Panama Canal to Cincinnati, (The Queen was the only paddle wheeler to traverse the Panama Canal). The Greene Lines ran the Queen until 1969 when it was sold to American Classic Voyages. In 2006 the Queen was sold to Ambassadors International Inc. based in Newport Beach California. The Delta Queen called Cincinnati its home port until 1985 at which time it was moved to New Orleans. Since 1946 some of the more than half a million vacation passengers are 3 Presidents; Jimmy Carter, Herbert Hoover, and Harry Truman: Supreme Court Justices Earl Warren and William O. Douglas; Princess Margaret; Hollywood's Marilyn Monroe, Helen Hayes and Errol Flynn. The Queen was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1989. In 1970 it was listed on the National Register of Historic Places. 
   Some minor notes: the Queen was the first steamboat to have air conditioning. She is 285' long and 60' wide and weighs 3,360 tons. Her paddlewheel is 19' wide and 28' in diameter. The 2000 horsepower motor propels the boat about 10 mph. She carries 174 passengers with a crew of 80. The first two images are not postcards.

                           
Delta Queen in the Panama Canal                                    Boarded up for trip               
May 10, 1947                                                                                    

               
Going thru Ohio River Lock                                                                                                                                     Tied up along the         
                                                                                                                                                                              Cincinnati shore.

                
                      Grand Staircase                     Mark Twain Lounge

               
Observation  Lounge                                                                       

                                
                         Dining Room                                             Buffet                Forward Cabin Lounge

calliope

   Some calliope information: You can play a calliope using either steam or compressed air; there is an average of 32 whistles on a calliope, the worlds biggest is on The Mississippi Queen with 42; at one time, there were 9,000 calliopes on the Ohio and Mississippi River systems. The Delta Queens whistles were made by Thomas Nichol of Cincinnati in 1897 for the Water Princess, which sank in 1930. The whistles were salvaged and installed on the Delta Queen. The calliope is named after the Greek muse of eloquence. 

   Vic Tooker was the Delta Queen's banjoist and steamboat interlocutor. He is shown here with his vaudevillian parents Guy and Alice Tooker who had worked showboats and steamboats all their lives. This card is signed by Vic and his mother.

   The Sister-boat to the Delta Queen is the Mississippi Queen which was built in 1976. 

THE STEAMER GORDON C. GREENE

   The Greene Line Steamers were founded in 1890. Since then there has been a total of 26 different steamboats operating out of Cincinnati. Always a family affair the company, founded by Gordon C. Greene and his wife Mary (both Captains, Mary being one of the very few women to ever pilot a steamboat on the river). After Gordon died in 1927 Mary and her two sons, Chris and Tom (both Captains) ran the company. Captain Chris Greene died in 1944 leaving Mary and Tom to run the Greene Line. Mary died shortly after Tom Greene had brought the Delta Queen to Cincinnati in 1949. There is a life-size bronze statue of Captain Mary Becker Greene on the Covington-Newport Kentucky riverwalk overlooking the Cincinnati riverfront. Captain Tom Greene then died in 1950. It was now up to Tom's widow Mrs. Tom (Letha) Greene to take over the reins of the Company. The Greene line was in financial difficulties due to the purchase and renovations of the Delta Queen so Letha was forced to sell all the Greene line boats except the Delta Queen. Thanks to the dedication and determination of the Greene family the steamboat survives today despite all the trends of today's society. The Delta Queen is one of their most famous boats. That boat renewed the overnight passenger business for our generation.

                                                 
Captains Gordon & Mary Greene                   Captains Chris, Mary, Tom                   Captain Mary Greene     
  1903                                                             1943                                                              

   The Gordon C. Greene was built in 1923 at Jeffersonville, Indiana as the Cape Girardeau. She was bought from the Eagle Packet Co. in St. Louis in 1935 for the Greene Line and became the "family boat," providing a home for Captain Tom and family "down at the foot of Main Street."

                       
                                                                                                                 Painting by Russ Porter

Chris Greene

                       
    Marine Ways                       Loading Steamboat                         Snag Boat                            Steamboat at night
                                                    These boats cleared the
                                                       river of obstacles.

                               
Steamboat Bonanza                     Steamboat Lizzie Bay                     Queen City.  Pittsburgh & Cincinnati Packet Co.
 ran from 1885 to 1916                                                                                                                                                                      

                               
  Virginia                                            Not a postcard                                      Island Belle
  Virginia  in cornfield

   The Sternwheeler Virginia was one of the boats owned by the Pittsburgh & Cincinnati Packet Co. In 1910 it was caught in a flood at Willow Grove, West Virginia. The water set the boat down 750' from the river in a cornfield. Through the use of cribbing and rollers the movers, (John Eichleay Jr. Company from Pittsburgh, Pa.) was able to move the 235' long boat to the river's edge. The steepness of the bank presented problems. According to the local papers, "Eichleay prayed for rain" and the rains came, the river rose and the Virginia floated into the river. The first  postcard above show the Virginia after it had been re-floated. The sign on the side of the boat in the 1st card states the above facts. The boat was renamed the Steel City in 1912 and was then acquired by the Coney Island Co. in 1923 and renamed The Island Belle.  In 1927 it was again resold to the Greater New Orleans Amusement Co. Docked at Paducah it was rebuilt and renamed Greater New Orleans.

The Steamer Brilliant

   This real photo postcard was probably produced in the 50s from a very old photograph. It shows the Brilliant that was built in 1848 and made the Cincinnati to Pittsburgh run. This wooden-hulled side wheeler set a speed record, for then, of 1day, 21 Hours, 46 minutes. It was dismantled after only five years in 1853.

^{FOR  MORE  STEAM BOATS}