Rusting towboat, last of its kind, gets a lifeline
Steam-driven stern-wheeler may leave soon for Ohio shipyard.
DAYTON, Ohio - Steam-driven paddle-wheel towboats once plied Midwestern rivers by the hundreds, pushing barges to feed industry's appetite for coal and steel.
Those days are long gone, and the only intact, steam-driven stern-wheel towboat still on the nation's rivers is in danger of sinking unless preservationists can tow it to a repair yard downriver to patch up its rusting hull. It will have to go limbo-style under low bridges along the way.
For 54 years, the W.P. Snyder Jr., half the length of a football field, has been moored on the Muskingum River in the southeastern Ohio city of Marietta.
The boat "really matters in American history," said Kevin Foster, chief of the National Park Service's maritime heritage program.
The Snyder is "one of a kind," the last remnant of the age of river steam power, said William Judd, a longtime river captain.
Driven by steam engines with a paddle wheel on the stern, the Snyder was among 600 to 700 such towboats around the country in the early 20th century. It was built in Pittsburgh and took coal from the mines to the steel mills.
Many mills built and owned such towboats because they wanted control over the coal, said Jeff Spear, president of the Sons & Daughters of the Pioneer Rivermen.
"They were the workhorses," Spear said.
As they were replaced by diesel-powered vessels, steam towboats began to fade away. By the mid-1950s, only about a dozen still operated, and by 1960 they had all but disappeared.
In 1955, the Snyder - named after the president of the Crucible Steel Co. of America - was sold for $1 to the Ohio Historical Society to be exhibited next to the Ohio River Museum in Marietta.
Moored in Brownsville, Pa., the Snyder was given a fresh coat of paint and then embarked on a spirited cruise on the Monongahela, Ohio and Muskingum rivers through Pittsburgh; East Liverpool, Ohio; and Wheeling, W.Va., before arriving in Marietta.
Joseph W. Rutter, 86, of Marietta, was among the 100 passengers for the last leg of the five-day voyage. People lined the banks and exchanged waves, cheers and whistles with the passengers, he recalled.
Now, the Snyder's steel hull is rusting from the inside, and the boat cannot be saved if it sinks, Spear said.
Preservationists are preparing for the crucial hull-repair voyage to a shipyard in South Point, Ohio, 150 miles from Marietta. The trip could begin as early as this week.
The Snyder, under tow, will have to slip under several low bridges on the narrow Muskingum and squeeze past a pivoted railroad trestle before hitting smooth sailing on the broad Ohio.
Once the stern-wheeler arrives at the shipyard, its hull will be replaced with plates that will be historically accurate. The project could take as long as eight months.
"They're going to have to be tender with her," Spear said of the 91-year-old boat. "You don't want to put any more tension on her than they have to."
The preservationists are also racing the weather. If the river rises too much from the fall rains, the boat will not be able to clear the lower bridges and could be blocked for months from getting home and resuming its role as a museum display.
Replacing the hull will cost $1.18 million, a project funded by a Save America's Treasures grant from the Park Service, state funds, a pledge of $85,000 from the Rivermen group, and other donations.
Preserving the Snyder will keep the memory of steam-powered paddleboats alive, said Judd, 74, of New Richmond.
"The whistles they had were beautiful, melodious whistles. They would give you goosebumps on your arms," Judd said.
