Topic starter
13/01/2010 10:15 pm
As part of preparing the Howard Collection to go on line at UofL, I've done a history of each boat pictured. From those histories some interesting facts came out.
There are photos of 252 different boats that I could find histories on, the rest were mostly later small diesel boats which were not listed in any Way's directories.
There were: 116 PACKETS; 33 FERRY BOATS; 103 TOWBOATS
Average life in years:
PACKETS...............18.5 yrs
FERRYS ................25.1 yrs
TOWBOATS ...........30.5 yrs
DISPOSTION
SANK ...................38 PACKETS 38% 13 TOWBOATS 12.6%
1 FERRY 3%
FIRE ....................39 PACKETS 33%
19 TOWBOATS 18.4%
2 FERRY 6%
ICE .....................12 PACKETS 10%
1 TOWBOAT 1%
1 FERRY 3%
DISMANTLED/RETIRED ..27 PACKETS 23%
70 TOWBOATS 68%
29 FERRY 87%
As you can see a packet boat had about a 1 in 3 chance of sinking, a 1 in 3 chance of burning, a 1 in 10 chance of being destroyed in ice, and only a 1 in 5 chance of operating until retirement while a towboat had better than a 2 out 3 chance of retiring.
Just thought you might be interested in those figures.
13/01/2010 11:23 pm
Life expectancies of boats
Interesting stats Jim. So, OK, why do you think towboats lasted longer? Fewer people on board to cause problems, start fires, etc.? Barges in front of a towboat protected it from snags, ice, etc.? Towboats built sturdier?
Topic starter
14/01/2010 12:13 am
Judy, I really believe it was everything you mentioned.
Topic starter
14/01/2010 3:14 am
There are a couple of things that I noticed that may have squed the firgures.
1. Most of the pictures that Jim Howard took were over the period 1890-1930. Starting about 1916, Howard's built very few packet boats and were transitioning to steel hull towboats.
2. Since most of the towboats Howard built were steam, the life spans of their steel hull towboats were actually cut short because towing companies in the 50's, just like railroads, eleminated steam and replaced them with diesel. Most of those 1950s diesel towboats are still running. I believe a steam, steel hulled towboat could also have lasted 50 yrs, some of Howards steel hull diesel boats did. The SPRAGUE lasted 43 yrs.
3. The ice of the winter of 1917/18 cut short the life span of many Howard packet boats because about 9 Howard boats were cut down by that bad ice from Cincinnati all the way down to Helena, Ark.