Ship of the Month - cont'd. 8. formed on January 2 2 , 1914, as a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Ontario Pa per Company Ltd. This, in turn, was a subsidiary of the Chicago Tribune, the large U.S. newspaper for which the firm manufactured newsprint at a new pa per mill which had been constructed at Thorold. MARY H. BOYCE was added to the then-small O. T. &P. Co, fleet, but she was not immediately brought into Canadian registry. We do not know what arrangements were made with the Canadian authorities to permit a vessel registered in the U. S.A. to engage in Canadian domestic trade, but the BOYCE did just that for three years. She was placed in the pulpwood trade, bringing wood up to Tho rold from St. Lawrence River ports, and also down from the north shore of Lake Superior. The little steamer usually carried coal on her return trips. During her O. T. &P. Co. years, the BOYCE was painted in much the same manner as were many other wooden steamers in various fleets. Her hull and stack were all black, and her cabins were white. The Paper Company did, however, make one change in the steamer, and that was to add a rather flimsy wooden upper pilothouse on the monkey's island atop the old pilothouse, where an open n a vigation bridge had earlier been located. The new cabin undoubtedly was much appreciated by those who had to stand watch on the bridge in all weather. During the 1916 and 1917 seasons, MARY H. BOYCE could often be seen towing the wooden schooner-barge MIDDLESEX. This vessel had been built at St. Clair, Michigan, in 1880 as a steamer (U.S. 91307 ), but after a November 1 8 , 1881, fire at Pequaming Harbor on Lake Superior, she was rebuilt at Algonac as a schooner-barge. She was 184. 0 x 3 2 . 5 x 12.3, 618 Gross and 57 8 Net, and she served numerous owners over the years. The O. T.&P. Co. acquired her in 1916 and thereafter she ran the pulpwood trade with the BOYCE. This arrangement lasted until August 13, 1917, when the barge broke tow whilst downbound in the St. Lawrence River, approaching the Rapide Plat near Morrisburg, Ontario. MARY H. BOYCE continued on her way, undamaged, but MIDDLESEX stranded in the rapids, became a constructive total loss, and was abandoned to the underwri ters. She later was salvaged by Sin Mac Lines Ltd., Montreal, which had her rebuilt in 1918 at Sorel as the barge (b) WOODLANDS (C. 138504 , as which she served into the 1 9 2 0 s. MARY H. BOYCE carried on, the only other vessel in the fleet at that time be ing the steel-hulled canaller TOILER. The TOILER was sold in 1918, and in her place, the O. T. &P. Co. acquired the wooden-hulled steamer LINDEN, which had been built in 1895 at Port Huron, Michigan, and which was a little lar ger than the BOYCE. Together, MARY H. BOYCE and LINDEN supplied most of the company's pulpwood, the majority of the cargoes originating at Franquelin or Shelter Bay on the lower St. Lawrence River. On May 21, 1919, the BOYCE at last was brought under the Canadian flag, being enrolled at Toronto under official number C. 140994. The two little steamers continued together until 1922, when the fleet took delivery of the first two steel-hulled canal steamers built specifically to its order. These were CHICAGO TRIBUNE (I) and NEW YORK NEWS (I), which were built in the United Kingdom at Wallsend-on-Tyne and Londonderry, respective ly. With the two new steamers in service, the company no longer required the services of the two wooden vessels, and they were sold to other operators, the BOYCE in 1922 and the LINDEN in 1923. In fact, the Lake Carriers' Association had recorded that, back in 1919, MA RY H. BOYCE had been sold by the O. T. &P. Co. to A. R. McCormick, Montreal, but this must have been some sort of internal corporate arrangement, for on March 22, 1922, MARY H. BOYCE was reported sold by the Ontario Transporta tion and Pulp Company Ltd. to N. M. Paterson & Company Ltd., Fort William. This latter firm was the first of the shipping companies formed by Norman M. Paterson and Donald E. McKay, and in its infancy this fleet operated three wooden-hulled steamers, MARY H. BOYCE, the 1880-built JAMES P. DONALDSON, and the little D. R. VAN ALLEN, which had been built back in 1874. Paterson used MARY H. BOYCE mainly in the grain transfer trade between the various elevators at Fort William and Port Arthur, although she did make oc-