Steamboat terminology/slang

Jenny, I'll start off with a few. Credit must be given to a wonderful individual, the original Riverlorian that taught me a few "steamboatisms", Karen "Toots" Malloy:

Steamboats in the 19th century were typically packet boats, a packet boat was one that carried passengers and freight. Some of the freight carried was the alive and self motivating kind, and due to the odors created by livestock they were typically carried on the lowest decks. Now, as a paying passenger, if you wanted the least odoriferous stateroom, you had to pay the highest price for the highest/farthest away stateroom from the livestock. To pay for the highest price stateroom it was assumed that the passenger was quite wealthy and was therefore Living high on the hog.

The steamboat boiler stacks had intricately cut metalwork at the top resembling sometimes feathers, their purpose to help keep sparks from the boilers to stay/fall back into the stacks rather than come out and fall onto the roof or decks. As the boats were made of wood and sometimes carried flammable freight, such as cotton bales, keeping the sparks inside the stack to burn themselves out was an important thing. The various steamboat owners over the years made their boat's top of stack metalwork fancier, more delicate, more intricate and the "feathers" on the top of the stack also known as "flutes" became an advertisement to how fancy the boat was. The more artful the flutes were was interpreted as a very fancy boat and people that rode those boats were High Falutin' and the boat was seen to be Well Stacked.

A steamboat that was built, I'm sorry I don't remember which one, with the same number of passenger rooms as there were States of the Union at the time. The owner decided to gave states names to each of the rooms and called them Staterooms.

Very interesting subject. I hope others chime in. Toots, you reading this? I'll add to this as soon as Deb and I are past this senior moment and can remember some more...

Jenny,

Check this website of former Riverlorian Jerry Hay

River Books & Programs -> by Jerry Hay

Carmen

This is wonderful information. Thank you so much!

Jenny

Jenny, in the Creedance Clearwater Revival song "Proud Mary", you know the one..."Big wheel keep on turnin', proud Mary keep on burnin'. Rollin', rollin', rollin on the river..."

Proud Mary was dried horse manure used as boiler fuel, so I've been told...

Jenny,

there is a steamboat terms glossary at steamboats.org: Glossary of Steamboat Terms | steamboats.org with many, many steamboat and river terms.

Captain Jack Ross wrote As They Say On The River, a very comprehensive dictionary of river terminology, compressed into 100 pages. Perhaps you can find one.

At present Captain Charles Lehman's much larger book of river words and usage called A Lehman's Lexicology is in the hands of a publisher at present. Stop your project until this book becomes available!

original riverlorian

I noticed Bruno said Karen was the original Riverlorian. She was the first to do the talks as a designation position with the company and coined the title Riverlorian. However, I used to do what I called "Navigation Dissertation" in the early seventies. I am looking at the "Steamboatin' Times" of August 13th, 1972 listing the talk as "Find out where we are and where we are going plus other interesting stories and facts about the rivers". I used pilots, mates, & others when they were availavle as guest speakers. Don Sanders and Jim Blum were great. Captain Loudon was my favorite but he would not speak in front of an audience so he would tell me stories to tell the pax, some of which I found out later, were sheer fabrication. When I left the boats I told the company they had to continue the program as the pax loved it. Karen and her colleagues took the program to a whole new level and it became the most important daytime program for the boats.

On Stage

Captain Doc Hawley could actually be called the First Riverlorian. When Doc left, and I took his place as First Mate, the Nav Dissertation became a regular part of my daily duties. Soon after lunch was served, the waiters set up a few rows of chairs in front of the stage in the Orleans Room and sometimes there would be quite a few faces in the audience.

Once I got in trouble with Betty and Bill the time I put on a show about "Music on the River" where I employed several of my most talented deckhands as a rhythm band. Although Ed Duemler played a wicked banjo and guitar, B & B called me into Franklin's office and warned me to steer clear of Vic Tooker's territory in the future and leave the tunes alone. Ed, I hear, now plays music in a Nashville band.

The big difference with us, back then, was that we pre-riverlorians not only lived the life, but were nourished by men and women who were steamboating in the late 19th and early 20th Centuries; so we were nurtured on those stories straight from the nag's lips. There's something compelling in that.

Captain Harry Louden, everyone's favorite steamboatman of that era, was a great story teller and master pilothouse showman, but, as Mariam said, he was about as animated as a clam when it came to performing before an audience other than those he knew and trusted that gathered around him as held forth while steering the steamboat.

Also Jenny there was an author/Riverman/playwrite by the name of Richard Bissell that wrote a few books back in the fifties and sixties I believe that were fiction but great stories and would have some terminology from back in the day. The ones I remember were High Water, A stretch on the river, and My life on the Mississippi or why I'm not Mark Twain.

Through the years there have been so many incredible river historians, from back in the days before Toots formalized the Riverlorian program and brought it forward so amazingly, right up to the current times to include all the talented people who occupied the position on all the vessels. I remember Mariam's excellent ability to answer just about any questions passengers asked, though by the time I knew her, she had traded in her hostess/lecture duties to become Cruise Director. Great and fun to work with, and I'm sorry Bruno never got to cruise with her.

Jazzou,

This is the chance I have waited for to recognize Toots for her work on the river.

Many people may not know the extent of what she did by working to make the Riverlorian program happen on the boats. Nor do many of them know how she worked to make sure there was a symmetry between the boats where possible. Toots really made it happen and many thousands of passengers owe her a debt of grattitude, for it was her work that opened their eyes to the glory of our inland rivers. She even had great influence in the Entertainment Department on the boats...to keep it accurate, historical...and entertaining!

I am too indebted to her, for putting something together which became the greatest achievement of my life. I can't imagine who I would be now if not for the years I was able to serve on the DELTA QUEEN, MISSISSIPPI QUEEN, and AMERICAN QUEEN. They were, in my estimation the best years of my life. I pray every night I have the chance to do it again, right there along with her, as I have had the great pleasure of doing in the past!

Travis

Bruno, I heard that Proud Mary was the nickname of a tugboat, the Mary Elizabeth, that worked in the Memphis TN area. I never heard the horse manure version. Either version may or may not be true. Anyone out there got the facts?

Proud Mary on .org

John Fryant;17783 wrote: Bruno, I heard that Proud Mary was the nickname of a tugboat, the Mary Elizabeth, that worked in the Memphis TN area. I never heard the horse manure version. Either version may or may not be true. Anyone out there got the facts?

That was discussed somewhere on here earlier this year, and I think PM was dried cow dung. I believe the Bates/Schiffer fraternity was at the heart of that discussion...