Topic starter
11/12/2007 4:42 pm
Greetings From New Orleans ,
" Why was Columbus able to discover the New World " ??
Answer ; " He didn't have an ENGINEER to tell him , You can't do that " !! From the first day I ever steped foot on a boat , regardless if it was the DQ , the MQ , or any one of a number of tow boats and ships too for that matter , there has always been this very appearant and distinct atmosphere of rivalry and even animosity between the WHEELHOUSE CREW and the engineroom crew . Why is that ?? Do engineers just simply do not know their place or is it nothing more than over inflated male egos and too much male testostrome ( on their part ) in a confined environment such as a boat regardless of its size , or is it simply that engineers just can't handle having to take a subservient role and position far below ( both literally and figuratively ) the well deserved , glamorus and distinguished WHEELHOUSE CREWS ?? During my tenure on both the DQ and the MQ , I had to " straighted out " a few first assistant engineers and for that matter a few chief engineers as well , and needless to say it was no small endeavor , but fortunately common sense prevailed and they saw the " error of their ways " and came to their senses !! Also , I've know a few poor souls , in my time , whom were obvisiously scizzoid , whom suffered from holding both deck and engineering licenses , and that I know secretly they only dreamed of and with the help of medication , advancing and elevating themselves to a more prestigious and lofty position in a cultured and civilized position in the PILOTHOUSE as opposed to their unfortunate " situation " in the bowls of a boat . Fortunately , at least on the passengers boats , there is a hotel dept. that even the engineers can look down on and despise and receive some limited degree of superiority over . So , there you have it folks , my totally unbiased thoughts on why you should always take pity on and lend a helping had to , anyone whom has been relagated to a position in the engineroom of a boat !!
Smoothe Sailing !
Ted Davisson
11/12/2007 5:00 pm
right.....all of us engineers are an issue... ;-). I used to be an issue, thankfully modern pharmecuticals are now working to keep "all of me" in check...
now all you need to do is sustitute the term wheelhouse personal with the term architects and I could say Welcome to my world, but obviously from the superior ENGINEERING side of the rose colored glasses. hee-hee-hee...
There is nobody higher on the food chain than engineers, try to remember that and you will do fine...we're right, everybody else is wrong, just ask Deb...
Thanks, Ted, funny stuff. That was tongue in cheek, right?
Bruno Krause
Professional Mechanical Engineer
New York PE License #061120
Also in NE,VT,IA and MA
11/12/2007 6:40 pm
What's a Side Door Pilot?
Cap'n Ted,
All those old engineers we worked with, like the old pilots, were probably suffering the complaints of being around the steamboat too long past their prime. And then, like you said, some may have resented the wheelhouse crew decked out in clean shirts while they spent a lifetime with grease under their nails.
Looking back, after my 9th license renewal for Inland Master, All-Gross, including a few whistles and bells, I sometimes wish I'd stayed in the engineroom, when Big Cap gave me the choice, and "larned" something.
If only we could tell some of those funny stories on here that we witnesses. I would give folks a different perspective of life on a steamboat back of the house. No mint juleps served there.
11/12/2007 8:41 pm
There was a large family of Wrights on the Kanawha River. Some were pilots, some were engineers. On one occasion an engineer saved the day. He had a habit of looking through the engineroom door and the side vents when they approached landings and locks. The pilot, a Wright, rang to stop. Owing to a broken wire the bell did not ring. The engineer, another Wright, looking at the shore as usual, got worried and started backing strong, thus saving the day. At supper the master, a third member of the Wright family, looked the Wright pilot dead in the eye and remarked, "You may as well pack your suitcase to off of her. With our engineer we can get along without you."
On the Belle of Louisville we had an engineer like that named Chet Foster. Chet told me one time, "You needn't worry about hitting that wharfboat
The only time we had friction between departments was when Frank Foster, Chet's cousin, came to her. He was jealous of his engineroom and lord help the deckhand, pilot, master or mate who entered it uninvited! He even painted a stripe on the deck to show the extent of his territory.
11/12/2007 8:45 pm
You are so-o-o-o right, Sam. Much of what we saw, did, and had done to us is not for public display. The public wouldn't understand, anyway.
11/12/2007 9:35 pm
Myth - Wheel House vs Engine Room
There is a reason that the Coast Guard requires "Left" and "Right" to be posted in the appropriate places at the steering station in the wheelhouse. Those of us that can read, write and cipher would find it stifling to sit in a chair all day long, following a memorized route over and over.
I have never had the slightest animosity toward pilothouse personnel because of their job. They are doing the best they can with the skills they have.
The first "double-ender" that comes to mind is Lisa Streckfus. She is a excellent engineer and she can always fall back on her master's or pilot's license when she needs a rest.
The masters, pilots and mates that I have a lot of respect for were the one's that made certain I knew that they felt we were a team working together for the common good and safety. Many of them had worked in the engine department for a time and had a basic grasp of the engineering functions. The respect was mutual and I always slept better at night when they were on board.
Dennis Shenk
Ch. Eng. Steam
Issue #8
11/12/2007 10:42 pm
As a retired Architect, (Texas, 5466) I tend to look at it from the other side of the drawing board...... 'Course there are still General Contractors for you to look down on.
12/12/2007 4:13 am
It's still there and that's OK by me, regardless of pipe wrenches and or verbal threats.
12/12/2007 1:54 pm
Can of Worms
Of course it took a pilot to open this can of worms. I have an interesting story about 6 licensed pilots in the wheelhouse of the MQ trying to reach an agreement as to the correct time and why each was "right". I feel the thread starter to this question is summed up well. Delusion and Ego. Many of those who claim superiority as a person or due to their position are also those who's school grade cards read "Doesn't play well with others". This social isolation has followed these people their whole life. Others of the same mind set come together and form a social protection group of like, but misguided minds.
There is a reason that the wheel house is isolated from the rest of the vessel. It's not for the pilots protection! While the 360 degree view of a wheel house is said to be for the pilots field of vision, it's really to feed the piolts ego with "Hey everybody, look at me". No one does but, but it makes the pilot feel better about themselves. Pilots also tend to be afaird of closed in spaces and the dark. Just one of the many reasons that pilots are envious of Engineers who have over come or never had those fears.
As Chief Shenk pointed out, wheelhouses are much simpler in equipment as an engine room causes sensory overload to a pilot which causes a pilot to have doubt. Doubt is a very threating thing to a pilot. I have never known a pilot to admit to being wrong.
I think the idea that a pilot or Capt. ever "Straighted out" an engineer show the delusion that pilots live with. I'm sorry that say, Chief Al Bolten, can not offer the other side to this story.
As to the mental stablity of Double Enders, that will be covered in another posting. Should someone take offence at my posting, get a therapist and a life, just poking fun, like what started this thread
Please feel free to vent your feelings on here or to [email protected]
A landlocked Double Ender, on Meds!!
12/12/2007 4:17 pm
Steamboating colleagues:
I find all of the above discussion fascinating and informative, as long as in good taste with a bit of humor. I've just finished a monograph here ready for the editor on the ANDREA DORIA/STOCKHOLM sinking, July, 1956. One segment gave me fits in composing that I'd like to share here: "Since ancient times the design, building, propulsion and navigation of ever larger ships evolved to exercises of applied mathematics and the dependence of all officers and crew from the top down. In the modern era officers and engineers are trained in vessel stability, steam and diesel mechanics, hydraulics, carpentry, electricity, ventilation, weather forecasting, food preparation, health and sanitation, liquids fuels, chemistry, environmental factors, admiralty law, foreign diplomatic relations along with dynamics of crew administration. Vessels are complicated life support systems and, like a living organism, intricately interwoven to keep all in running order. The failure of one system, crew department or component could spell disaster to all. The captain on the bridge maintained close raport with his chief in the engine spaces far below. At times all he had to do was verbally relay "Fog" and the engineer knew instantly what to do with no further instructions."
Research in the early days of sail and steam navigation reveal that the term 'ship's carpenter' later evolved to 'engineer.' Under sail and some steamships the 'carpenter' was one of the highest paid personnel aboard next to the captain. A number of our naval vessels today still hold the practice of having the captain, and his immediate officers, rotate periodically to stand watches with the chief in the engine room below for familiarity and to 'get a feel' of their ship from the bridge down. No job or position on any vessel is to be looked down upon or ridiculed. All work together as a team for the good of all and the survival of all. Surprisingly officer/crew uniforms outside of commissioned navy vessels came along rather late with some saying it was for appearances along with impressing the passengers. Until not all that long ago once a captain, his officers and crew, departed their ship they were put on half-pay. The exception being the engineer, carpenter and maintenance crew who stayed aboard for continuing service.
Grievances by lower ranking officers and sailors were addressed to the captain in writing or resectful 'speech' formally...as long as it didn't verge on mutiny. More than one captain found himself hauled before the British Admiralty or Navy Department questioning his 'Command.' Capt. Bligh found that out with his infamous BOUNTY experience. He made his point in bringing the mutineers to trial but was later found "lacking" in commands and even a diplomatic position ashore. In the early years of the U.S. Navy one Secretary of the Navy faced the tragedy and humility of his own young son being tried for mutiny and hanged from the yards with crew members on deck hauling the line.
Not all 'pure steamboats' but links slightly. Capt. Fred Way was once asked if there ever had been a recorded incident of a 'mutiny' on a steamboat. He smiled saying, "That's a good story to tell down the road." Capt. Fred quelled a mutiny of sorts on his BETSY ANN but that's for another time. Who out there ever read/heard the rest of his story?
Well, what do I know?
Cheers,
R. Dale Flick
12/12/2007 7:32 pm
On our little steamboat, my husband and I switch ends halfway through each trip. We also alternate on who's up first at the beginning of each trip. That makes two doped up double-enders, who are also married to each other, running a boat; a recipe for disaster according to prevailing wisdom. However, we have had relatively few defugaments. It just doesn't help anything to play the blame game. It's always my fault anyway.
13/12/2007 9:11 am
Was there ever a riverboat mutiny? Yes. Captain Cuba A. Foster had one. He worked on the R. J. Nugent. He became over-friendly with the fireman's wife, who was a cook on the boat. The fireman got a hint of it and commenced throwing lumps of coal at the pilothouse in protest. When the Nugent reached the sand digger the empties were set off and the loads made up to tow to Louisville. Cubie went to the digger to get all the papers, etc., and the crew simply took the towboat and left him there. Cubie got on the digger's radio and called the Coast Guard. About half-way to the landing the crew found the R. J. Nugent being boarded by Coast Guardsmen bearing heavy-duty arms. When the steersman was asked where he thought he was going, he told them they were going to the sand company's yard. Nobody was arrested or charged. Nobody was hurt. The sand was delivered. There was a lot of hoo-haw around the Louisville harbor for a couple of weeks and the incident was dismissed.
The Fosters were a steamboating family from Mauckport, Indiana. Cuba was a pilot. Frank and Chester were engineers. All were crackerjack rivermen.
13/12/2007 11:34 am
Steamboating colleagues:
Thank you Alan Bates for the story RE: 'mutiny on the R.J. NUGENT.' If Capt. Fred Way ever put it down on paper I missed it along the way. Lesson is that if I'd bought your complete 'Indexes for the S&D REFLECTOR' I would have possibly gotten some leads.
In time I'll get it together with the story of Capt. Fred Way's own 'mutiny on the BETSY ANN.' Are there other such cases out there? Question: What would the Coast Guard have done if arrests had been made following the NUGENT incident?
Cheers,
R. Dale Flick
13/12/2007 5:32 pm
In the September 1974 REFLECTOR on page 45 no less of an authority than Captain Fred Way, Jr. offered this bit of information on the relationships between captain, pilot, and engineer. He lifted it from the crew newspaper published onboard the U.S.A.C.E. Dredgeboat JADWIN. Please, pardon the sexist language; I am quoting here!
"A pilot is a man who knows a great deal about a very little and who goes along knowing more and more about less and less until finally he knows practically everything about nothing.
A captain on the other hand is a man who knows very little about a great deal and keeps on knowing less and less about more and more until finally he knows practically nothing about everythingl
An engineer starts out knowing practically everything about everything and he ends up knowing nothing about nothing, due to his association with pilots and captains."
Being a chief engineer's son this seems 'bout right to me. 😉
13/12/2007 6:34 pm
Lexie Palmore;8920 wrote: On our little steamboat, my husband and I switch ends halfway through each trip. We also alternate on who's up first at the beginning of each trip. That makes two doped up double-enders, who are also married to each other, running a boat; a recipe for disaster according to prevailing wisdom. However, we have had relatively few defugaments. It just doesn't help anything to play the blame game. It's always my fault anyway.
Having enjoyed the privilege of a trip or two on the "Graceful Ghost", I can assure all that the method described by Cap'n Lexie must be working because it delivers one delightful steamboating experience!