Erie Railroad - Erie Railroad Lake Line - Union Steamboat Line History

From the April, 1914 issue of Erie Railroad Magazine
ERIE RAILROAD LAKE LINE DIVISION.
Its History, in Part, With Comparison of Steamers as They Were and Are Today.
By H. C. Snyder, Assistant General Freight Agent, Chicago.

With the opening of navigation on the Great Lakes this month, the Erie Railroad Lake Line Division, begins its forty-fifth year of service, dating from its incorporation in 1869, as the Union Steamboat Company, which will be referred to at greater length later on.

At the close of the Eighteenth Century the entire number of vessels, by all ownerships, on Lakes Erie, Huron and Michigan, consisted of three schooners and six sloops. A survey ordered by the English Government in 1788 suggested that vessels on Lake Ontario might be of sixty or eighty tons burden and that those on the other lakes should not exceed fifteen tons burden; but ship-builders, from experience, have continually increased the size of vessels, so that today ships of 13,000 tons freight carrying capacity are being operated.

In 1818 the first steamboat made its appearance on the Great Lakes. It was a side-wheeler and naively called "Walk-in-the-Water." It was launched at Buffalo. An oil painting shows it to have been a small craft with a curious tiller, no pilot house, a smoke stack consisting of six lengths of stove pipe and tin boxed paddle wheels. It plied between Buffalo and Detroit, a distance of about 265 miles, and carried from forty to fifty passengers, who paid a fare of $18 per trip, which frequently took from 12 to 13 days, as compared with the same number of hours nowadays. One stormy October night this vessel went ashore near Buffalo and thus ended the career of the first steamboat on the Great Lakes.

In 1827 and 1832, respectively, the first steamboats reached Sault Ste. Marie and Chicago. This was the beginning of the real development of commerce on the Great Lakes, as we know it today. While the Erie Railroad Lake Line boats do not now operate to Lake Superior, at the same time it will be interesting to know about the Locks at Sault Ste. Marie (usually referred to as "The Soo"), at the head of the St. Mary's River, the connecting link between Lake Huron and Lake Superior, which make it possible to handle the large tonnage moving to and from the Lake Superior region.

The building of the Soo Canal was urged for twenty years. Finally Congress, in 1852, voted three-quarters of a million acres of land to aid the State of Michigan in building this canal, utilizing the St. Mary's River. The first lock was to have been 250 feet long, but the State legislature of Michigan finally decided to build it 350 feet long. The work was carried on under many hardships, as the surrounding country was then a wilderness, but the task was completed in a little over two years, at a cost of nearly two million dollars.

The United State Government completed the Weitsel Lock in 1881. It Is 515 feet long, 80 feet wide and 13 feet deep at low water. The Poe Lock was opened in August, 1896, being 800 feet long, 100 feet wide and 18 1/2 feet deep. On March 2, 1907, Lock No. 3 was authorized and is now nearing completion; it will be 1,350 feet long, 80 feet wide and 24^ feet deep at low water. Lock No. 4 was authorized by the Government July 25, 1912; dimensions to be the same as Lock No. 3. The necessity for these larger locks is due to the marked increase in size and carrying capacity of modern coal and ore boats, some of which are over 600 feet long and carry as high as 13,000 tons of ore, and are indicative of the demands of the enormous traffic moving to and from the Northwest through Lake Superior. The Canadian Government also controls one lock 900 feet long, 60 feet wide and 19 feet deep.

In 1852 the Erie Railway Company brought passengers to Dunkirk, N.Y., and sent them forward in the side wheel steamer "Alabama" to Cleveland. This is supposed to have been the first rail and lake passenger service on the Great Lakes.

The Ohio Basin, at Buffalo, was dug in 1853, and the earth from this excavation was used to make the land upon which our present Eastbound and Westbound Buffalo Lake freight houses stand, also the land where the Erie Elevator stood, before it was burned in 1913. Prior to the Erie Company securing the property it was used, in part, as a ship yard, where many of the early lake vessels were built.

In the beginning of this article reference is made to the incorporation of the Union Steamboat Company in 1869. Records indicate that as early as 1858 the Erie Railway Company had a lake connection with Milwaukee and that freight of the Erie Railway Company and the New York Central Railroad was handled on the same steamers.

Official records give the following very interesting history:

Union Steamboat Company, incorporated Feb. 3, 1869 in the State of New York. Jay Gould, President; S.D. Caldwell, Vice-President and General Manager.

At a meeting on Feb. 4, the same year, President Gould was authorized to purchase the steam propellers: "St. Louis," "Toledo," "Atlantic," "Pacific," "Arctic," "Marquette," "Araxes," "Orontes," "Evergreen City," "Equinox," "Dunkirk," "Eclipse," "Missouri," "Wabash," "Canisteo," "Passaic," "Tioga," "Olean," Elmira," "New York," and a new propeller (not named), then building for the Erie Railway Company, at Buffalo.

At the same meeting Vice-President Caldwell was authorized to contract with the Erie Railway Company for the operation of eighteen to twenty-two propellers on the Great Lakes, in connection with the Erie Railway Company. The business of the Steamboat Company increased rapidly, and on Jan. 19, 1870, authority was granted to contract for two such propellers as would, in the judgment of Vice-President Caldwell, be best adapted to the requirements of the trade, the cost of the two vessels not to exceed $150,000.

The report of the New York, Lake Erie & Western Railroad, for the period ending Sept. 30, 1878, states the Union Steamboat Company then owned a fleet of sixteen steamers and two schooners, with an aggregate capacity of 19,478 tons. Reference is made to a new steamer then building, to be 200 feet long, 37 feet beam, 1,850 tons burden; estimated cost $100,000.

PROPELLER "ARCTIC," WHOSE FREIGHT CARRYING CAPACITY WAS 500 TONS.
The accompanying picture of the propeller "Arctic," carrying capacity about 500 tons of freight, is representative of the boats generally in service in the sixties, and makes a marked and interesting contrast, when compared with present day modern steel steamers, as represented by the steamer "F.D. Underwood," 4,500 tons freight carrying capacity, which is one of the eight steel steamers composing the present fleet with an aggregate freight carrying capacity of 24,800 tons.

The Union Steamboat Company, as a corporation, became extinct upon its merger with the Erie Railroad Company, June 30, 1896; from which time it was called the "Union Steamboat Line," until Jan. 29, 1913, when the name was again changed to Erie Railroad Lake Line, to more clearly identify it with its owner, the Erie Railroad Company.

The fleet is now in excellent physical condition, due to mechanical improvements made in the last few years, under the able direction of Messrs. Babcock and Penton, Engineers and Naval Architects, New York and Cleveland, and the economies effected in operation have been very marked, especially in fuel, and, notwithstanding the high record of service made during the season of 1913, we are pleased to announce that we can start the season of 1914 with the assurance of General Manager Dunkle, that our service this season will offer to the shipping public added inducements over those given last year, which were much appreciated, as indicated by the marked increase in tonnage handled.

In this very brief history of the Line, it would be amiss were I not to mention some of those who have had to do with its affairs since the late sixties.

Messrs. Washington Bullard and T.T. Morford, were two men who worked themselves up from the position of Dock Clerk to that of General Manager, and left records with the shipping public that are today frequently referred to. C.M. Cottrell, who was the first exclusive Agent of the Line at Milwaukee, his services dating from 1862 to Aug. 4, 1899, the date of his death, was also held in the highest esteem by people in all walks of life. Robert W. Vasey, appointed Assistant Agent at Chicago in 1885, was most conscientious in his duties, and his loyalty was beyond question of doubt. His very high standing with the business public was shown at the time of his death, about three years ago. H.B. Ford, who was afso appointed Assistant Agent at Chicago in 1885 and Agent in 1900, continues as the Dean of the Chicago Lake Agents, in consequence of his valuable experience and long term of service at Chicago. Seth Caldwell was the first Agent at Buffalo, in 1869. He was succeeded by R.H. Hebard, who, in turn, was succeeded by James McCarty. When consolidations were made in 1907, between the Lake Line and Railroad organizations, Mr. McCarty became one of the staff of our Assistant General Freight Agent at Buffalo, but he still holds to the strong ties of his early lake associations.

I am indebted to Messrs. J.C. Binton, New York; E.U. Baker, Chicago; H.B. Ford, Chicago; W.J. Fitzgerald, Milwaukee and James McCarty, Buffalo, for the historical data furnished, which has been used in part only, in this article, and hope at some future time to continue along similar lines with more details about the boats, their Masters, the Ports and services rendered in the early days.

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