Maritime History of the Great Lakes

Scanner, v. 28, no. 4 (January 1996), p. 8

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Ship of the Month - cont'd. 8. the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, some 35 miles south of Sault Ste. Marie, the plant's product being loaded into the company's self-unloaders at a dock at Port Dolomite. To help service this facility, the corporation decided that additional tonnage had to be added to the Bradley fleet, and two ships were transferred over from the Pittsburgh Steamship Division in 1956. The first of these was MYRON C. TAYLOR, which went to Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin, where the Christy Corporation converted her to a s e lf-unloader. She loaded her first cargo of dolomite out of Port Dolomite in mid-Octber of 1956. The second ship selected for transfer from the Pittsburgh fleet to the Brad ley Line turned out to be none other than the A. F. HARVEY. Before the end of the 1956 season, the HARVEY was sent to the yard of the Defoe Shipbuild ing Company at Bay City, Michigan, and there she was converted to a self unloader of the conveyor type. Her first two hatches were removed to permit the installation of the elevating equipment, and she was fitted with a 250foot-long, forward-mounted boom that was equipped to swing through an arc of 110 degrees. In the course of this reconstruction, the ship's tonnage was increased to 8575 Gross and 6229 Net, while she wound up with a carrying ca pacity of 12, 800 tons of stone on her mid-summer draft of 21'8". In addition to the hull and deck alterations, there were some modifications made to the steamer's bridge to better fit her for service as a self unloader. The pilothouse was expanded slightly by the pushing out of the back wall by the width of two more windows on each side. The old foremast was removed and its upper section was remounted atop the cargo elevator. In addition, flying bridgewings were deemed necessary to provide visibility aft for the navigators and to facilitate unloading operations, and the wings were fitted flush with the floor of the pilothouse (and hence several steps above the level of the bridge deck itself). Additional crew accommodations were provided in a large new deckhouse added on the boat deck right aft. The rebuilt ship was painted up in the traditional Bradley colours, with a grey hull with red trim, white cabins, silver elevator and boom, and a black smokestack with a broad grey band bearing a large, black letter 'L '. Very shortly, however, the company added a smaller black letter 'M ' superimposed over the shank of the 'L ', to better reflect the identity of the Michigan Limestone Division of the corporation. This 'M' was added to the ship's stack design very soon after she entered service as a self-unloader. While MYRON C. TAYLOR retained her old name when transferred to the Bradley fleet, it was deemed appropriate to rename the HARVEY, and she became (b) CEDARVILLE, this name being chosen to honour the new plant she would serve. The rechristening took place on Saturday, May 25th, 1957, at Port Dolomite, and the sponsor of the vessel was Rita Smith. The festivities included public inspection of both the steamer and the shore plant. Interestingly, the christening included the smashing against the CEDARVILLE's bow of a champagne bottle refilled with lake water. Hindsight is always 20/20, but perhaps the corporation might have been better advised to use the "real thing" in the bottle, instead of the lake water, in that the waters of the lake eventually would overcome the ship and claim her forever. Both CEDARVILLE and MYRON C. TAYLOR proved to be valuable additions to the Bradley Transportation Line, and with nine ships running in 1957, the fleet set a new record for tonnage of cargo carried. Of the 1 1, 500, 000 tons of limestone, cement clinker, coal and iron ore hauled by the fleet that sea son, 2 , 500, 000 tons were dolomite loaded out of Port Dolomite. The 1958 season was less successful, however. That season got underway late, there were labour problems, and then, late in the year, the fleet suffered the first of the only two major losses in its history. On Tuesday, November 18th, 1958, the 1927-built CARL D. BRADLEY (II) foundered in heavy weather near Gull Island in northern Lake Michigan, whilst bound light ship from Buffington, Indiana, for Calcite. Two men were saved but 33 lost their lives in the as-yet-unexplained accident.

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