Capt. Ford's Gaff Topsail Rigging. - Whatever croakers may say, (and thee are always those who will croak, with about as much wisdom as an owl - particularly if they have no direct interest in the croakable matter), the invention of Capt. Geo. A. Ford of this city is, as far as adaptability...

    Collision and Loss of a Schooner. - On Thursday, July 7th, the propeller Bristol, bound up, and the schooner Azov, bound down, collided on Lake Ontario. Immediately after the collision taking place everything was done by the captain and crew of the propeller to render assistance to the ...

    Shocking Casualty! _______ Explosion of the Steam Tug Tornado! _______ Three Lives Lost! _______ Total Destruction of the Tug! _______ Shortly after three o'clock this morning, a large proportion of people in the city were suddenly aroused by a deep jarring report of a heavy explosion,...

    Marine Disaster. - The schooner Norwegian, owned by Morgan Wheeler Esq., of this city, and the tug Maria Melvin, owned by J.D. Murphy, Esq., went ashore at an early hour this morning, a few hundred yards below the east pier, opposite Fort Ontario. The Norwegian, Capt. Chas. Brown, was on her...

    Wrecking - The insurance companies have engaged powerful pumping apparatus from Kingston and Buffalo, to put on board the schooner Norwegian and tug Melvin, and the probabilities are, should the weather prove moderate, that both crafts will be got off and brought into port. ...

    The tug Highlander from Kingston, is at work today endeavoring to pull off the schooner Norwegian, which went ashore opposite Fort Ontario on Saturday last. The tug Maria Melvin, which went ashore under Fort Ontario, was hauled off this forenoon by the Canadian steamer Wellington, and taken to...

    Loss of the Schooner E.B. Gannett. - The schooner E.B. Gannett, Capt. Warner, which left here Saturday night for Ogdensburg with 40 tons of waterlime, sprang a leak when some twelve miles down the lake and sank in deep water. The crew got aboard of the yawl and came ashore at Nine Mile Point....

    TERRIFIC EXPLOSION _______ Destruction of the Steam Tug Dodge - Heavy and Wide-Spread Damage - Remarkable Escape of the Crew from Injury - The City Treated to a Mild Earthquake Experience. _______ About ten minutes past 4 o'clock this morning, the whole city was aroused by a most ...

    From enrollment records: Vessel built in Philadelphia, Pa. , 1864. 65x18x6 37 tons (US#10546)

    A Melancholy Narrative of Shipwreck. - During the storm of last week, the Canadian schooner Jessie, belonging at Port Stanley, was wrecked at her entire crew of eight persons lost, on Salmon Point, which lies about opposite this port on the north shore. The Belleville Ontario gives the ...

    TUG EXPLODED. - A dispatch from Oswego on the 6th says: The tug Tornado exploded her boiler this morning, about four miles up the lake. Capt. W. H. Manwarring, Morry Atchison (sic), engineer and Zebulon Stone, deck hand, were all lost. The tug was valued at $12,000, with no insurance. ...

    THE TUG TORNADO . - This tug, which was sunk Saturday morning last near Oswego, was built in Oswego by Messrs. Kittle and Moore, and was about eight years old. She was owned by Messrs. Smith & Post, was a staunch one of the largest size, and one of the most powerful on Lake Ontario. The ...

    *a guess - original nearly unreadable

    *timber head - a crude bollard made of a timber projecting through the deck.

    Fire in the Harbor. About half-past ten o'clock last night the propeller Wm. Cowle took fire while lying on the east side of the harbor, and considerable confusion was created for a time in the efforts to prevent the flames from spreading to the surrounding shipping and reaching property on ...

    NOTE: The BENTON was a small (308 gt) passenger and freight steamer built in 1867 by Hitchcock & Gibson, Buffalo. She was converted to a bulk freighter in about 1883 and burned to a total loss at the Ford Rouge Plant, near Detroit, in August, 1909.    

    This little article shows a pair of the hazards of "stern-launching." Parentheses are in the original.

    The figures for the lakes appear to include only American tonnage. Though the figures don't actually add up, you get the idea. The total tonnage figure represents roughly 2,200 registered U.S. vessels.

    This is the only instance I know of of a vessel being so totally destroyed by the action of escaping air as she sank. The fact later brought about accusations that THORNTON was totally unseaworthy at the time of her loss. She was 274 gt, built by Bidwell & Banta at Buffalo in 1853.

    SCHOONER SUNK. - A dispatch from Oswego from Capt. E. P. Dorr states that the schooner E. B. Gannett , loaded with plaster consigned to Ogdensburg , sprung a leak twelve miles north of Oswego and sunk. The crew took to the yawl and reached the shore in safety. The Gannett was built at ...

    LAKE COMMERCE. - During the month of June we have reported the names of vessels passing ( Detroit ) to the number of 1,534 in the aggregate, divided as follows: Up. Down. Total. Steam 179 184 363 Barks 112 107 219 Brigs 14 14 28 Schrs 455 469 924 _____ ...

    Note this vessel's unusual engine arrangement, with two compound engines running a single shaft.            

    Campbell, Owen & Co. later became the Detroit Dry Dock Co., one of the most prolific and innovative shipbuilders on the lakes. The vessel on the drawing board in the article probably came out as the double deck passenger freighter GORDON CAMPBELL the next year. S. R Kirby, who had been designing...

    THREE MEN LOST FROM A VESSEL. - The schooner Geo. F. Foster , of Chicago , Henry Smith , master, and bound from Chicago to Lincoln , Mich., lost three men by drowning and the yawl-boat yesterday at 2 o'clock p.m., when about 6 miles north of the Kalamazoo . Charles Grimes , an American,...

    NOT LOST. - Charles Peterson and John Lynch , the sailors of the schooner Geo. F. Foster , who were supposed to have been drowned on Thursday last, arrived in Chicago on Saturday and from them we received the following particulars of the recent disaster: They state that when Grimes ...

    The SHIAWASEE reportedly also survived the ordeal. She was a brand-new barge, out on her first or second trip, while the WARD was a former steamer and barkantine.

  Detroit Free Press (Detroit, MI), 16 Sep, 1870, page 4page 4  Column 7 The hull converted to a drydock at Bay City, Michigan, (not Saginaw) on the Saginaw River, was the PLYMOUTH ROCK's sister WESTERN WORLD. The Saginaw River dock was used into the 20th Century, and remnants of it are still visible. Articles on the 1854 launches are at this site.      

  Detroit Free Press (Detroit, MI), 11 Oct. 1870, page 4page 4  Column 6

    In effect, this meant that small inland freighters and passenger vessels had to be licensed, registered and inspected if they were used on any waters connected with the lakes by navigation routes, since they were potentially part of interstate commerce. Only vessels operating on isolated inland...

    There are also instances of hull breaches being plugged by boulders and blocks of ice, but this is the only report of a fish saving a Great Lakes vessel of which I am aware.

    ROND EAU HARBOR. - Chiefly through the exertion of Hon. Rufus Stephenson , M.P., of Kent County, Ontario, the Canadian Government has been induced to proceed with the contemplated improvements at Rond Eau Harbor, in that county. Tenders for the work have been called for to be sent in to...

    Northern Transportation Co. apparently made its arrangements, as it continued to operate on Lake Ontario in 1871 and finally folded about 1875.

    Here is another example of the many important improvements to navigation that were first built in the 1860's and 70's and are still in use today.

    KINGSTON ITEMS. - The News says that the propeller Bristol , from Lake Huron shores, arrived on Saturday evening, and discharged 3,000 bushels of her wheat into Swift's storehouse, and thence proceeded to Montreal . The steamer Osprey and propellers East , St. Lawrence , ...

    AT LAST. - Steps have at length been taken to raise the old steamer formerly used by the yacht club and which sunk during one of the storms last winter. Capt. Parkinson , of the Bouquet , has taken the job fair in hand and has bulkheaded the interior of the vessel, previous to setting the...

    THE SCHOONER THORNTON A TOTAL LOSS. - By the arrival of the propeller Arctic from Lake Superior , information is received of the loss of the schooner Thornton in Lake Huron , about fifteen miles from False Detour , off the foot of Cockburn Island . Capt. Lamphere , of the Thornton,...

    APPARENTLY A BAD CASE. - The sinking of the schooner Thornton , ore laden, was announced in these column a short time ago. Facts with regard to the loss have just come to light, which place the owners and master of the vessel in rather awkward positions. When she left Marquette she was ...

    AN EXPLANATION. - A few days since the Chicago Republican published a statement relative to the sinking of the schooner Thornton , which cast a poor reflection on her owners. The Cleveland Dealer pronounces the same as "untrue in all its many statements." It adds, "The schooner Thornton...

    Capt. N. W. Napier was Nelson W. Napier of St. Joseph, who was lost in the sinking of the Alpena in 1880. Clerk James R. Clark went down on the Chicora in 1895.

    Although the above clipping states that Langley died in Chicago, his death record states that he died while on Lake Michigan.