Fold up model of the MQ

Paul,

You know how much I have always loved the MQ...but, I figured I would be the one to get the jab in before others do....

It is easy to make a box out of a box.

There it has been said

Travis

boxes of a different kind

It is strange how when you look at all the ships in american history, from the great sailing shipps to the new cruise liners of today. They are very gracefull and pleaseing to the eye, especially the 3 mast sailing ships. Yet when you look at the riverboats they are not the most pleasing vessels to look at. Why do you think the builders built them so boxy? All ships and riverboats are built for work, yet the ocean going vessels were more attactive. I sit and look at the Delta Queen an woner why o I enjoy looking at this odd thing? The one I have been more drawn to is the Mississippi Queen. For some reason I have found I can stare at her even on the bridge cam and pictures on the blogs, regardless of her condition she is oddly very pleasing to the eye. At this time though a sad eye. I wish she would have been the one to make the journey th Chattanooga to become the hotel, Instead of rotting in a city that has fogotten her. A toast the the ugly ducklings all of them as they are the most beautiful boats in the world.

ed frazier;20364 wrote: It is strange how when you look at all the ships in american history, from the great sailing shipps to the new cruise liners of today. They are very gracefull and pleaseing to the eye, especially the 3 mast sailing ships. Yet when you look at the riverboats they are not the most pleasing vessels to look at.

I don't like trite sayings, but beauty truly is in the eye of the person beholding it. Aesthetically, I think the AQ is just the most beautiful boat I ever saw. True, when compared to blue water behemoths, she is not a large vessel. But viewed on her own, silently gliding into, say, LaCrosse, she is really gorgeous. Something that big slowly and quietly approaching, with her pre-MAL white paint job, cannot help but give you pause.

This is a video of her landing at LaCrosse in 2007. It's hypnotic. See for yourself. Try to ignore the MAL paint job and picture her gleaming white.

YouTube - Steamboat A Comin

In August of 2002, I arrived in NOLA to begin rehearsals for my stint on the Mother Ship. Bob Stevens and I went out to dinner and he drove me down to Robin Street to visit the AQ. She sat there silently at the dock. As I entered the parking garage, all I could see were parts of her main deck peeking through the openings in the garage wall. When I actually got out onto the dock and saw her entire port side, she actually took my breath away for a second.

Paul

Travis Vasconcelos;20361 wrote: Paul,

You know how much I have always loved the MQ...but, I figured I would be the one to get the jab in before others do....

It is easy to make a box out of a box.

There it has been said

Travis

Trav,

:O)

I can't say I loved the MQ, but I did get attached to her. Couldn't help it. I was onboard for about seven months straight with only one week back home while they de-Norovirused her in St Louis. She was often a trial due to lack of attention by her owners and odd configuration. I was not a big fan of the entertainment "office", usually finding somewhere to hit my head while publishing the Steamboatin' Times every day. I always got the feeling that her shortcomings were not her fault. As I said goodby to her at the dock on 11/26/06, fully expecting to return as her cruise director in a couple of months there was no hint of what was about to happen to her.

Like a boxer who stays too long, they had to drag her off the river. She never gave up and went down fighting. You gotta love that, I guess.

Paul

Paul,

You are right, the lines of a boat are what draw you to it.

River steamboats were not boxy by nature. The end of the line boats were more so than the early boats. Most of your earlier steamboats, particularly the sidewheelers, were lucky to have even one straight line on them. They were graceful curves held together by hog chains and turnbuckles! Someone once compared the sidewheeler to a swan. I couldn't have said it better. They were swans of grace and elegant curves.

Yes, the sternwheelers were more workhorse styled vessels. They had a propensity to be flatter of line and less adorned with gingerbread and fretwork. But, to call them boxes is not to take into account these flat as a board mega-hauler cruise ships of today. Most cruise ships lack all aesthetic features of their forbearers. The few steamboats left today pay homage to their forbearers with allusions to the lines, gingerbread, and fretwork indigenous to the craft.

Even the blatant fake replicas of steamboats always have crowned stacks, gregarious gingerbread, red paddlewheels and the like. Most of the modern era cruise ships do well to have a pointed bow and a visible bridge from a distance. Todays cruise ships are boxes with virtually hidden bridges and stacks upon stacks of private verandas all compartmentalized into a small box where you are to celebrate your moment at sea. Now days, even the graceful curve of the stern of a cruise ship has been removed for a slab sided flat ending. The one that shocked me the most with this was Cunard's QUEEN MARY 2......the most slab-sided flat backed, graceless character to carry the proud name CUNARD on its flanks! CUNARD should buy back the QUEEN ELIZABETH 2 and get her back out there where she belongs! She is the last of her breed of authentic cruise ships with sheer, camber and the style and curve of a real Blue Ribband Liner!

On the DELTA QUEEN you can barely find a board of wood that is flat (or with out curve). So I don't know where she comes off looking like a box to Ed there!

Paul is right...the lines of the steamboats are breath taking! They have a sheer line of almost sensuous curve, many different heothgt, colourful decks, throngs of passengers, majestic smokestacks....need I go on?

Sorry, that hit a nerve there...they aren't boxy and flat...the MQ was quite boxy for a steamboat...but even she had many pleasing lines (her bow being one that was quite pretty, her stern lines of her hull were very, very nice....pleasant rake to that stern, too!).

I will stop there!

Travis

Paul,

I remember that Entertainment Office when it was the Projection booth! It was never suited for a person to spend much time around in either configuration! There were many places like that aboard the MQ. She had smaller hallways, smaller overhead clearances, smaller everything. It was part of her charm.

I used to marvel at how spacious the Paddlewheel Lounge felt when by square foot dimensions it was actually very small. It was the effect of a high ceiling in the middle that did it. Same for the Dining Room and the Grand Saloon.

The MQ was designed by the same person who designed the QUEEN ELIZABETH 2, James Gardiner (of 3 Quays Marine, London, England). He incorporated many of the top ideas of the day for the feel of spaciousness to both vessels. She really was built to lure cruise ship passengers to the Mississippi. Later she was "victorianized" to be sold as what she truly was, a Mississippi River Steamboat.

Personally, I think the modern brass and glass MISSISSIPPI QUEEN was the prettiest she ever was! She had a modern elegance to her that no other vessel could rival! The original grand staircase was understated elegance the likes of which no one knows today. Her staterooms were rather austere and needed a pick me up. But the public spaces were beautiful! Leather-clad furniture, glass tables, brass handrails, beveled glass mirrors 3 decks tall, recessed crystal light fixtures, earth tone bulkheads...her interiors were unbelieveable!

The exterior wasn't exactly perfect...but, the designed added details to make it more ascetically pleasing. The Gazebo rose across the centerline of the bow creating many differing effects to draw the eye up the superstructure. There were trim lines welded all over the vessel to accent the shapes of the windows. After 1979 these were painted a very familliar almost Beatty's Navy yellow. She even had nods to gingerbread on the roof aft of the pilothouse, which also got the yellow treatment after 1979 (It seems to me the Ice Cream Bar had it too...but, it was later part of the roof-top storage system which ate her roof up in later years and the gingerbread on it disappeared then).

Anyone remember the Ice Cream Bar on the Sun Deck ahead of the pool? It had Coke soft drink vending machines flanking it! How about the shuffleboard courts in front of the calliope whistles? It disappeared when people started taking the mallets to the whistles. They had to re-round about 5 of the whistles at the end of the 1985 season, I am told!

I think 1979-1982 were her best looking years. Once they added the trailer park of modern staterooms to the top deck, she started to loose her look.

Yeah, for all she wasn't...she was a heck of a place to work and a great place to call hoe.....and the last vessel on the inland rivers to use steam for everything aboard...propulsion, heat, heated water, and electricity! That is why I always called her the most authentic steamboat when I was her Riverlorian!

Yeah, she had me in her spell...huh?

Maybe it is time for a new thread called Mississippi Queen Memories?

I believe you are right about 79 to 82 Travis. And yes I am Biased but I remember those times when she was rather plain. And we first did the yellow or gold trim around the Main Deck Bow windows when I was a Head deckhand in 78. I was the first one to to paint that trim and it seemed to agree with her all those years. and I loved the old Theatre.... thats where John Hartford used to play for 10 or 12 of us late at night.

the early MQ

I remember the shuffleboard courts up by the calliope, and I agree that her original brass look was more attractive and suited to her style than the later Victorianization. Those superglued rooms on the Promenade were the worst thing to happen to her, in many ways.

you know I rarely remember anyone ever using the shuffleboard deck. and I agree about the rooms they added on the promenade deck. I hated the way they did that on the DQ too.

UW La Cross has recently posted a bunch of new photos in their on line historic steamboat collection. Among them are photos of the MQ under construction and in her early configuration, also many of Misssissippi (Becky Thatcher).

Your memories are book worthy

I wish I had the boating experience that you fellows have.The way you discribe the life on the MQ is great. I never ment to say I like the look of the new cruise ships, only the trans atlantic vessels and sailing ships of old. As for the Delta Queen she is very pleasing to look at and The MQ is somehow my favorite. As for the AQ it is just too big, beautiful but too big. I hope any one of you will start a memories of MQ blog I will be a captive reader. I was browsing in the archives yesterday and saw Travis' pictures with the Belle of Louisville in dry dock and really was impressed with the way the riverboats hulls look. and how they steer without getting into the wheel.

Wonderful site and so many awesome pictures! Here's the link if anyone wants to take a look:

UW La Crosse Historic Steamboat Photographs

To my eye, many of the new deep water cruise ships look like several bars of soap stacked up and then half melted into an ugly blob.
-Jim Herron

Ed, please see photos in the NATCHEZ curves thread under Steamboats and History. She's no box by any means.

Those were great times ED. I was on the MQ in her early days the year after she was built. I can honestly say I have covered virtually every inch of that boat, been in every room at least once, been in all the closets, cubby holes and even walked underneath the hull. My first year on the boat I stayed on for layup as a watchman while she was Drydocked at Todd Shipyard. I think the following year I stayed as a head deckhand, and a few years as mate. One year I worked layup on the MQ in Todd shipyard as mate for about a month then DQ in Boland Marine for another month or so. Worked the entire layup.