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Ship of the M onth a report - cont.d w h i c h was penned by John Skinner, 8. watchman. from I M P ERIAL CORNWALL, "On M a r c h 25, IM PERIAL C O R N W A L L lit e r a l l y broke the ice of the sa iling s e a son by being the first vessel to leave win t e r quarters and proceed downriver to the I m p er ial Oil upper dock and take on her first load. We w a r m e d up our engine s w i t h trips to Polymer and Dow (plants at Sarnia) before s t a rt in g out on a p o r t - o p e n i n g spree. A fter op ening the ports of Sarnia, Windsor, Bay City, Ow en So und and Britt, we had been p h o t o g r a p h e d and t e levised so much the actors' u nion was b e g i n n i n g to c o m p l a i n and seems as though some agent had bi l l e d us a half hour n i g h t l y show called 'U n s i n k a b l e s ', and no m i n a t e d us for an Emmy. "Now for a r u n - d o w n on the cast (Oops! excuse Thomas heads the list, co ming on board after sw it ch ed to the S I M C O E . . . " me) crew. Capt a i n W i l l i a m J. Capt a i n (A. G . ) Bert Knight The same issue ca rried a picture of Capt. Knight abo a r d the CORNWALL, being p r e s e n t e d wi t h the silk topper by G r e g o r y H ogan of the Sarnia C h a m b e r of Commerce. It also ca rried a report from IM PERIAL SIMCOE, sub m i t t e d by J. R. Sprung, who d e s c r i b e d h i m s e l f as the "little feller" of the SIMCOE's steward depart men t. It i n d icated that "IMP ERIAL SIMCOE pulled out of winter quarters on Ap ril 11 to begin an other year of hard labour for her c r e w . . . " Just so that we do not ignore the third sistership, we should i nclude the report from I M P ERIAL WINDSOR, c o n t r i b u t e d by steward Pat McCrorey. It said in part: "After leaving d r y d o c k at Port Dalhousie, the W I N D S O R a r r i v e d in To ron to to load its first cargo for C o b o u r g (six more trips were made there in qu ick succes sion). On arrival at Cobourg, C a p t a i n (James) Burns was gr eet ed by me mb e r s of the P e t e r b o r o u g h press to welc o m e the first ship of the season. "Repairs to the engine had to be made in Toronto and this gave us all of Ea ster W e e k e n d docked at C o m m i s s i o n e r s Street. N e e d l e s s to say, this was a p p r e c i a t e d by the men aboard who make H o g t o w n their h o m e t o w n . . . " IM PER IAL W I N D S O R a p p a r e n t l y ran into some trouble (unspecified, but s e e m i n g ly a ground ing) later in the 1963 season, for a report in the Fall issue of "Fleet News" stated: "As you all know, we were in d r y d o c k at Port Dalhous ie for ten days... After our misfortune, we went to Sarnia winter q u a r t e r s to find out the extent of damag e we had suffered. W a t c h m a n Ma r t i n Smid was asked to don his skin diving equipment and go down to give some estimate of the damages. Diver Dan was only too happy to oblige and he went m e r r i l y about p r e p a r i n g his eq uipment for the main event of the day, and so, w ith a large ch e er in g section, he b r a v e l y dove into the chilly depths of the St. Clair R i v e r ... " This same 1963 season was a busy one for IM PERIAL SIMCOE, in that she s t r a y ed from her usual M o n t r e a l to To ronto and Sarnia service. In our earlier feature, we r e m a r k e d that she had seen more salt -water service than her two sisters, and that this was the main rea s o n for her earlier r e tirement from service. She made two trips to salt water in 1963. On the first, she loaded two tanks of Va rsol (solvent) for Montreal, and the balance for Halifax, wh ere she ar ri v e d on May 14. She was back at Sarnia by May 27th. On her second trip "down east", she cleared Sarnia on S e p tember 6, with two tanks of fi ni s h e d lube oil for Sept-Iles, while the balance of the cargo was V a r sol for Halifax. She arri v e d at H a l i f a x on the 15th, and after d i s c h a r g i n g the Varsol, she loaded furnace fuel for S a g u e n a y v i l l e . She arrived there on the 21st, u n l o a d e d her cargo, and then sailed in ballast for Montreal. There, on S e ptember 23, the SIMCOE loaded lube distillate, and then she he ade d back into the lakes, wi t h Sarnia as her destination. If n a v i g a t i o n had begun e arly in 1963 for IMPERIAL CORNWALL, it also was a long season. As usual, she spent most of her season on Lake Huron, where she had become k no wn a f f e c t i o n a t e l y as the "Bay City Special". She freq u e n t l y vi si t e d Britt, Parry Sound, Owen Sound, Wi ndsor and M i c h i p i c o t e n with g a s o line, and o c c a s i o n a l l y had a m ixed load for Toronto, all i n t e r s p e r s e d with