Boone County, Kentucky Steamboat/s

Tom,
You might find some interesting info and photos for Boone County at this link:
Northern Kentucky Views: Boone County

Steve: I found the steamers CAROLYN and the DART but no info in Way about them but did find some things of interest. Thanks for the reference. Cap'n Walnut

photos of the KENTUCKY

Tom, I didn't check the books/photos you had, but here are the two I have of the KENTUCKY. The third one of the KENTUCKY's cabin, I presume is of that boat, rather than of the other KENTUCKY which became the TENNESSEE BELLE. This cabin is small and austere, and you can almost 'see' the uneven lengths of the rooms to which F. Way referred.

Judy: You are quite correct about Fred Way's prose, and, yes, this entry is a classic. I have quoted parts of it to others many times over the years. I'll hafta look up the citation on Gasboats that Alan mentioned. I would suppose that Fred had the same view of gasboats that "Rags" the Greene Line dog had. Neither of your pix duplicates what I found. The one of the cabin IS, I feel the Greene Line KENTUCKY. What is their source? Cap'n Walnut.

Boone #7

You will find some good pictures, links and information about Boone #7 right here in our group at
Boone No. 7 Anderson Ferry | steamboats.org

Growing up in Northern Ky, I was introduced to the Anderson Ferry as a small child by my parents and have ridden on Boone #7 a number of times. I introduced it to my wife and son myself years ago. Until now I never had any idea it was ever steam powered. This group provides us with valuable information that even those growing up in the area did not know. Did #7 ever have a whistle?

Wasn't the DONALD B (BARBARA H) working the sand fleet downstream of Anderson's ferry before you bought her? I remember seeing the DB there on many occasions. Wouldn't that make the BARBARA H a Boone County boat, of sorts?

Tom,
There was a CAROLYN that towed the ferry at Lawrenceburg before 1917. It was a gasboat. It was later used as a small packet/towboat between Louisville and points on the Kentucky River.

I have this info, and a photo:

CAROLYN, gas boat, built at Madison, Ind., in 1907, owned in 1915 by Sam Woodford, Savannah, Tenn.

Vevay Newspaper Mid-August 1917:
"John C. Heady has been a business visitor to Louisville this week. While there he purchased the gasoline towboat CAROLYN which he will use to carry freight to and from Louisville."

Could be. The Donald B was owned by Brookbank Sand & Gravel until late 2000, when I bought it. In 2000 the boat was only active in the Maysville/Aberdeen area, but they did work with Hilltop Resources(?) down in the Boone County area (Indiana side) and could have made trips to Belleview. Prior to 1940, when the Brookbanks bought it, the boat had towed Red Crown Gasoline in the 20s and 30s, mainly between Marietta and terminals on the lower Big Sandy River.

Richard: In the summer of 1955, I worked for Arcose Construction who were building houses in Covedale at that time. I lived in Park Hills and rode the ferry every work day in my '37 Ford over and back. I would take Amsterdam Rd down Dry Creek and over the ferry, up Anderson Ferry Road to Cleves/Warsaw or wherever we were building at the time. Becoming friendly with Mr Kottmeyer...then owner of the ferry, he told me about the conversion to diesel in 1947...not too many years before. He said he still had the steam engines. In later years, I photographed BOONE NO. 7 locked in the ice in 1962 and rode it at Tall Stacks when it was a ferry across the mouth of the Licking Covington/Newport. It is certainly a Boone County icon. It is still moored near the Constance Ferry landing and not in use daily use but appears in fine condition. I assume that it is a diesel/electric else an engineer would of needs man the "offside" wheel. Cap'n Walnut.

Steve: Thanks again for your input. Did not see anything in Way that seemed to me to be the boat pictured. Said photo is alleged (and I believe) to be at Split Rock (near mile 500). Your info would seem to jibe with a day-trip excursion to Split Rock from Vevay, less than forty miles away. This of course begs the question: who took the picture and where did you get your print?? Cap'n Walnut

Shipyard/Steve: I find this info interesting...not only a Boone County connection, but still working. Cap'n Walnut

I think the CAROLYN image came from the collection at the Vevay River Museum. Perhaps via Dan Back.

I don't have any annotation on the pictures, so I assume I got them from Ralph DuPae. Whose collection he got them from, I don't know.

Judy: Thanks for the input. Ralph supplied many a photo to S&D over the years. Is he not retired now? Any how, many thanks for your photos. Cap'n Walnut

Ralph DuPae

Ralph died a couple of years ago, not too long after joining the Midwest Riverboat Buffs on a JULIA BELLE SWAIN cruise in his honor. Thanks to his sleuthing all over the country, the Murphy Library at the UW LaCrosse now has over 45,000 pictures and negatives of steamboats and their environs and many of us have extensive photo libraries through his sharing.

Doing a bit of digging in my dusty files, I found a reference to Boone County's McVille: "A sister city to Belleview, McVille was laid out by Green McMullen in 1881. Small steamboats were made there. In 1924, a lock and dam No.38 was constructed there..." I find nothing in Way's Packet or Tow Boat Directories. Anybody know about these. They may well have been small ferry boats...but it does say "steamboats". This is from Jim Reis' Pieces of the Past #1. Cap'n Walnut.

Thanks Tom. Boone #7 was a diesel electric for as long as I can remember. I never knew it was converted from steam until now. That makes things a whole lot more interesting. I was just wondering if it ever had a whistle as a steamer?

And, are there any photos from its days as a steamer? Or, for that matter, any photos dating back to when cars looked a lot different.

Another Boone Co. Boat

The DART. is seen at Stony Point, in Boone County, opposite the mouth of the Great Miami River, 20 September 1896. The DART. has all the looks of a J. W. Whitlock-built boat of Rising Sun, Indiana fame. J.W. was the builder of the famous HOOSIER BOY and many, many other boats of note on the middle section of the Ohio River.

My search through Dana Wolfe Hildebrand's most informative book, Two Miles Ahead - The Story of J. W. Whitlock, Rising Sun, 2003, the biography of her Great-grandfather, has no listing of the DART. that has all the looks of the Hoosier boatbuilder. Even the "period" after the name of the boat is a Whitlock signature trademark.

Richard & Lexie: I'll look for some early photos...I don't have any...but they might well show a whistle if it had one and I cannot imagine that it did not...part of the safety equipment! My Industrial Arts teacher (Seventh and eighth grades) was Robert H. Carter who lived long in Petersburg. He and his wife both mentioned elephants in the river. His wife said they were circus elephants and the owner wanted them across the river to Indiana. They would not go near the ferry (whistle?) so the owner got in a yawl and coaxed them to swim across. If I remember correctly, he had a time getting them out of the river as they went to playing around squirting water and din't want to stop! I wish I could find his wife's writeup on it. It does not mention the 'playing around' part. I had it on Saturday but now it seems to have vanished somewhere into my dusty boxes! I'll check the Boone County Library. It has several pix of early ferries but they are mostly horse-powered. Two horses on separate treadmills...each one running a side wheel. Cap'n Walnut

Shipyard: I too have viewed the DART with more than passing interest and wonder. What was it?? It seems a bit large for a private yacht but that's not beyond reason. As her name implies, she looks sleek and FAST...with a hull speed of over 8 mph with even a small power plant. I make out that she was about 40 ft long and can certainly carry a number of pax as in a ferry but there is NO accommodation for horses/vehicles...quite necessary for a ferry. Nor does there appear to be any accommodation to push anything as in a tug boat. I make out that the tiller lines were carried over the roof and that is a whistle and whistle cord ahead of the stack a bit. I'd say that's the engineer amidship, benefiting from the ventilation funnel. But what's that atop the pilot house name board? And, what is that 'boxlike' sturcture above the engine room that looks like a blind sklylight roof? It does not appear that there is much if any usable passenger space behind the boiler. Quite interesting! Are there any other pix extant? This is the only one I've seen. Way lists T0574 as: "Prop freight tb wh 1866-1872 b Akron Ohio 43x9x1 13.74 tons built on the Ohio and Erie Canal, perhaps a converted canal boat. Operated on Muskingum River 1865-1868, Cap't J C Bryant running Marietta - Zanesville tri weekly. Documented at Wheeling in 1867. News report from Cincinnati November 12, 1872 'Propeller DART down with three loaded produce boats for the South; she will pick up another one below here.' Not found in inspection records of 1873 nor later." Is this it? Cap'n Walnut

Progress

The DART. was probably not a Whitlock-built boat, but he built the GREYHOUND. and another fast boat much in this same streamlined style for fast passenger service between Rising Sun and Aurora, a distance of about ten miles, that brought the towns much closer together than did the horse-drawn jitney that took around three hours to cover the same distance. Ah, progress! It all may seem quaint now, but in its day the difference was stunning.

Here are a few old photos from my collection. First one is the oldest I have of the Boone No.7. The cars look like early 1950's, so this is the diesel-electric Boone, not steam. I don't have any photos of it prior to 1947. Other photos are of Boone No.6. The steam whistle is nicely visible in the middle photo.

Two more photos. These are of Boone No.5.