More SPRAGUE photos

That's a neat pic of the stateroom!

Sort of reminds me of the old Skid Row rooms that once graced the DQ...

Thanks for the pix, Keith. I am struck viewing these pictures (and from touring other old steam towboats) how spartan the cabins were, even the officers' cabins. There are no "homey" touches that I can see or have ever seen on the W.P. SNYDER, JR, GEO. M. VERITY, Dredge WILLIAM BLACK, etc. While officers' rooms on today's towboats are not quite like our homes, they are definitely much more "homey", with double beds, colorful bedspreads, rugs, nice curtains, pictures, etc. Of course, an officer's room these days without a telivision set is rare. It just seems that today's boats are quite a bit more comfortable and homey. I know also that the cabins on the towboats were always nicer and much more spacious than packets/passenger boats were. I'm as romantic about the old days as the next guy, but I am glad I live and work in today's environment.

That one room looks bigger than all of Skid Row. The plain, un-insulated, wooden walls remind, though, me of the old officers' quarters on the Sun Deck.

It was obvious that the "Big Mama" was designed for WORK and there were no glamorous amenities or "frills" of any kind that one would expect today. Capt. C.W. Stoll told me about the time he had coffee on board the SPRAGUE at Memphis when he was delivering an LST. He said that Capt. Hampton and the crew couldn't have been more gracious -- but that the coffee was so strong it nearly knocked him down!

Shipyard Sam;9407 wrote: That one room looks bigger than all of Skid Row. The plain, un-insulated, wooden walls remind, though, me of the old officers' quarters on the Sun Deck.

It actaully seems bigger than a DQ "AA" room...

I was thinking more along the lines of it being totally barren in nature...

Well, it looks like a pretty spacious room, with a sink & a tub (no toilet, however). It's much like the house I grew up in, although we had linoleum on the floor. I think we've all forgotten how basic housing used to be. OUr house had no insulation either--the walls were 1x12 nailed top and bottom to 4x4 beams, with battens on the outside between the boards and the inside walls were celotex nailed to the boards. Door and window frames were wider than the walls, and the window frames hung inside, much like this pic.
We never thought anything of it, and my brother still rents out the cabins at Cave Springs, which are just like that. (except they have a sperate room for the toilet & shower)
S'
David D.

My Sprague Visit - 1985

It is a special day when I can dredge something up to supplement anything Keith and Judy supply from their vast collections.

I made a quest to find the Sprague in 1985, following the Natchez Trace and the River Road down from Nashville.

I found her bones beside the road. A small fence encircled the site, otherwise I might have had a Sprague artifact. I settled for these pics.

These show some good shots of the Sprague's machinery, possibly the engines, but I appreciate correction on that if I am mistaken. Note how tiny the fence looks in the close up shot of the huge machinery.

Later that week we cruised on the President. I was treated to a great tour of the engine room, where the engineer was quite proud to point out the steam engines still in place on their timbers in those cavernous paddle boxes. He also showed me the water tube boilers, still in her hull.

It will take a few messages to post several more pictures. I will post the originals in high resolution on my professional site and place a link to them later for anyone who is interest to see or download these musty, oldie goldies in detail.

I am a "lurker" as Judy calls me, but I am an every day reader and hope to meet more of you as our paths cross.

Ed Jones

More Sprague '85 Pics - Where is it now?

Here are a few more. Note how large the wheel is compared to me and I am much closer to the camera! I was interested to see the big gear behind the crank, possibly related to the much referenced wheel rotation indicator to the wheel house. I was also interested to see the jack staff standing upright near the two stacks that appeared to be tied together in much too close proximity. That made me wonder if all of this stuff was from the Sprague, or the stacks and staff were propped up for display in a somewhat haphazard fashion to make this sad little museum of the remains. I also noted that the wheel was supported in a steel cradle welded up just for that purpose. You can see it clearly underneath the wheel in the picture.

From the latest pics posted on this board it seems all of this is gone. But to where?

Any helpful comments?

Great photos of the engines and wheel Ed -- and many thanks for sharing them! The jackstaff, capstans and a few other artifacts from the SPRAGUE are now part of a park on the Vicksburg waterfront called Catfish Row Landing. The stacks, engines, paddlewheel shaft and various other relics remain strewn beside Highway 61 and buried in mud along the Yazoo. More information about the park can be found at www.VisitVicksburg.com.

A couple more pictures

I took these on a visit to the SPRAGUE in 1971. One is a picture of the forward main cabin and the other is a picture looking down the boiler deck guard.
As you can see the SPRAGUE was no DELTA QUEEN, she was crude and BIG. Afterall she was nothing but a factory....a factory to produce ton miles and over the long course of her life time she produced millions and millions of them.
Not many creature comforts by todays standards, but when the SPRAGUE was built most of the crew either came off the farms or out of the mining towns. I'm sure a towboat with running water, electric lights, & refrigeration
was living very high on the hog for them.

The other picture

I haven't mastered sending two pictures at once....here's the cabin picture.

Pilothouse

Here's a picture of me in the pilothouse in 1971. The pilothouse was so big you could literally put a billiard table in it.

Ah, yes, Jim, nice photos of the DO NOT TOUCH signs, just like the photos of Keith not touching the stuff! And great photos Ed, but come on, a little old fence kept you from acquiring a real steamboat artifact??? You're too good a person - one needs to have a little larceny in the heart to be a collector!

From what I can gather, the Sprague's remains (other than what has been placed in the park at the landing) are north of the landing? And the see-able parts are still basically together in a single area? Are they within walking distance from the Vicksburg landing, say less than two miles? And if too far to walk, do people in Vicksburg, i.e. a cabbie, know where the remains are, or should I bring a map? Am I correct to believe this stashe' of parts are on the east bank of the Yazoo about two miles north of the landing? Or are they farther north than that?...

I'm thinking I would also like to see the Cairo again, too many questions now that I researched after I saw, so to speak, and just maybe I can swing over and pay my respect...

Incredible pictures...please, please more if you got 'em...

By edit...this website is just a treasure trove of information...from the Steamboat Traveler complete with Google images, within this website, I gather the Sprague's remains are about a mile due north of the landing, very near the east bank of the Yazoo, right? Hope it's fair weather in March...

The tendency to larceny was hard to overcome . . .

You are right Judy, however my wife was the one who shot the pic of me in front of the wheel and I was not sensing the same degree of enthusiasm in her for misdemeanors that day! Being in the dog house for a week now seems like a small price to have paid for a piece of the Sprague.

Attached are a couple of pics of the President when she was still in cruising form in NOLA. We cruised her on the same trip. A real treat. (1985)

Tangible links to our steamboat heritage are fading away too quickly, aren't they?!

- Ed

Bruno: I saw the stacks of the SPRAGUE lying beside Hwy 61 last spring -- just a short distance from the Vicksburg waterfront. I might be down that way in April and I'll investigate. A lot of the SPRAGUE remains have been buried in the mud and are hidden in the underbrush along the Yazoo. If you're there in warm weather, do be watchful for snakes, as they are numerous! Now that the towboat MISSISSIPPI (#4) has been taken out of the water and work has begun on the new Army Corps of Engineers Mississippi River Museum and Interpretive Center, they might be clearing that area of stuff.

The USS CAIRO and museum are awesome! Although I've been out there more times over the last few decades than I can count, it's ALWAYS interesting to see it again!

Indeed, THE STEAMBOAT TRAVELER is a terrific guide to steamboat sights and sites. Franz, Carmen and Leonie have left no stone unturned in finding anything and everything STEAMBOAT to be enjoyed. It's an understatement to say that they cover the waterfronts!!!!