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THE NORTH KING MYSTERY REVISITED Last issue, we featured as our Ship of the Month the Lake Ontario & Bay of Quinte Steamboat Company's passenger steamer NORTH KING, (a) NORSEMAN (91). We have received several comments about that feature and are pleased that our readers found it to be of interest. Our readers have also responded to our "unanswered questions" about the latter years of this steamer, the most important of those questions concerning when she carried two stacks. This question was sparked by the photo which appeared at the top of the back side of our photopage, showing NORTH KING with two funnels and also with an open rail forward on the promenade deck. When we looked at that photo, it appeared to us from the perspective of the view (and we were not alone in that assessment) that the steamer had two stacks set athwartship. Members Gerry Girvin, of Rochester, and Lorne Joyce, of Mississauga, have come forward with material which confirms the timing of the two-stack period in NORTH KING's career. Both gentlemen have dated photographs of NORTH KING with two stacks, and the dates would indicate that it was in the rebuild of 1890-1891 that the steamer was given two funnels. What is interesting, however, is that the stacks were set in tandem, not athwartship! From the collection of our late T. M. H . S. member, Willis Metcalfe, Lorne Joyce has come up with a beautiful photo of NORTH KING taken, apparently at Picton, by R. M. Roy and dated July, 1892, which shows NORTH KING close up and almost bow-on and leaves no doubt as to the arrangement of the funnels. If our printer can handle the extremely large photo, a reproduction of it will appear on the back side of this issue's photopage. Now, in our feature, we stated that the locomotive-type boilers were fitted in NORTH KING at the time of the 1890-1891 reconstruction. That may not be the case, although it seems likely that the ship was reboilered at that time. The 1899 Great Lakes Register, however, indicates an installation date of 1897 for the Weir and Sons locomotive boilers, and so they must either have been rebuilt that year, or else fitted new then to replace what must have been a short-lived second set of boilers. In any event, it would seem to be a safe guess that it was in 1897 that NORTH KING reverted to one funnel, and she probably got the closed rail forward at that time as well. Speaking of the year 1897, Willis Metcalfe noted that Chief Engineer Wm. A. McWilliams of NORTH KING recorded on Sunday, May 30th, 1897, that the steamer was denied passage through the Murray Canal (at the west end of the Bay of Quinte) because of the Sunday "Blue Laws"! Incidentally, Dan McCormick, of Massena, New York, has come up with a modern-day "100 Years Ago" newspaper item concerning a bit of news originally dated September 19, 1890. It reads as follows: "It is announced as definitely settled that this will be the last sea son that the steamer NORSEMAN will run between Charlotte, Ontario and the Thousand Islands. A new and modern steamer is to be built for the service the coming winter. She will be 180 feet in length, or 30 feet longer than the NORSEMAN. The latter will probably be used as an excursion boat on the St. Lawrence River. The new boat will be owned by C. F. Geldersleve (sic. ), of Kingston, Ontario, the owner of the NORSE MAN. " It seems, however, that the Gildersleeve interests changed their minds about building a new boat and, instead, took the less expensive route of totally refurbishing and lengthening NORSEMAN, the product of that recon struction, of course, being NORTH KING. We spoke a bit about NORTH KING'S service in the latter years of the nine teenth century, and we are pleased to be able to reproduce herewith the 1896 timetable for NORTH KING on the "Lake Ontario Route", as provided by Lorne Joyce via a copy of the June, 1896, issue (Vol. 1, No. 2) of the "Bay