What We Used To Tell The Passengers !!

And then there were those mysterious pump houses on concrete pilings that were condor condominiums. On the Lower Miss. at night, the throbbing well pumps and flares were Voodoo Camps. But a lot of times, you'd tell them the cold hard truth and they wouldn't believe it.

One of my favorites from the AQ. A lady was about to get on the elevator and turned to her friends and said, "I guess I'll have to activate my phone card, because I can't dial out from my room".

In regards to what we used to tell the passengers, I think I would only say that I agree with Franz, I have always had the greatest respect for the "wordly wise" guests we served; every day of my over 26 years aboard the Delta Queen exclusively I felt blessed to be exposed to the wealth of knowledge our mostly older, retired guests had to offer,I personally resolved to absorb the wisdom of these wonderful human beings, the pure insight to life and of the human experience. While I really don't mean to offend, most of those who have posted about the jokes and funny "misinformation' given to the "passengers" came from a part of the Delta Queens' history in the "old" days in which we were undisciplined and enjoying the "party atmosphere" that existed amongst the crew at the time, (come on, you guys know it is true!) The reality being that quite often our guests were much more experienced and "worldly wise" than we gave them credit for...But in the "exuberance of our youth" we often, I feel, failed to appreciate the gift of knowledge at our fingertips. Enormous thanks and respect for the work of Karen "Toots" Malloy for her bringing the storytelling of the river and it's history from fiction to fact, Toots, your contribution to this part of riverlore is not forgotten, and being carried on by the likes of Mary C.! To this day I still call many of the wise friends who blessed and honored us with their presence aboard our beloved boat.
Times evolved along the waterways and aboard the Delta Queen, to me, the "good old days" on the boat continued and my appreciation of this, the grandest experience in my life, grew. I stayed, and became inextricably connected to the Delta Queen. As perhaps the longest consistant, humbled working crewmember of the Delta Queen, (Yes, more than my friends Gabe, Doc, Ed Smith and Allen Segrest)I grew to know the old lady well, and she lives still in my dreams every night!
The old times where memorable, but in my latter years aboard as Master I constantly felt that things had changed for the better, less turmoil, and a crew focused on the guest experience... As far as "Those days", as some of you recall I was admittedly part of them,and only wish we all could have stayed together as we flowed to the zenith of the Delta Queens' life.
Soon I will release my true, honest accounting of life on the Delta Queen, not that I want to profit or attain celebrity, (which is unlikely with a steamboat history story,) but I feel that it is as if a child waiting to and will be born. Every guest and crew member of the Delta Queen remain the most chersihed memories of my life, those in which we laughed, cried, suffered,and ultimately triumphed and came away with one of the grandest experiences one could have in this life... The Delta Queen... We were there!

Cap: I agree! It's what you learn after you 'know it all' that counts. While I was never a DQ crew member, I did once "know it all". I hope I have gotten over it! Capn Walnut