Maritime History of the Great Lakes

Scanner, v. 30, no. 5 (February 1998), p. 5

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5. Ship of the Month - cont'd. The story of the ARLINGTON began back in 1913 when she was built at Wyan­ dotte, Michigan, by the Detroit Shipbuilding Company. She was one of four sistership canallers built by the yard to the order of the Geo. Hall Coal and Trading Company, of Ogdensburg, New York. The Hall order actually was for five canallers, but the first of these, LUCIUS W. ROBINSON, the ship­ yard's Hull 189 completed in 1912, was somewhat different from the others. Of the four sisterships, Hull 191, christened A. D. MacTIER, and 192, which was named F. P. JONES, were launched the same day, Saturday, March 8th, 1913. Hull 194, christened ADRIAN ISELIN, was launched on March 11, 1914, while the last, Hull 195, named GEORGE L. EATON (I), did not go into the wa­ ter until March 11, 1916. It is the F. P. JONES whose history we shall fol­ low, because this is the steamer which eventually became the ARLINGTON. The JONES was given U. S. official number 211084, and she was registered at Ogdensburg. She was 244. 0 feet in length, 43. 0 feet in the beam, and 21. 0 (some sources say 21. 8) feet in depth, and her original tonnage was 1706 Gross and 1059 Net. She was powered by a triple expansion engine which had cylinders of 18, 29 and 48 inches diameter and a stroke of 40inches, which produced 900 Indicated Horsepower at 85 revolutions per minute. Steam at a working pressure of 143 pounds per square inch was generated by two coal- fired, single-ended Scotch boilers, each of which measured 12'0" in diameter and 11'6" in length. There were four furnaces, with total grate surface of 80 square feet and a heating surface of 3, 400 square feet. The engine and boilers all were built for the ship in 1913 by the Detroit Shipbuilding Com­ pany. F. P. JONES' hull was built on the channel system, and she had a steel tank­ top. Three of her hull bulkheads were watertight, and she had two cargo holds. She had six hatches constructed on 24-foot centres. The forecastle was 38 feet in length, while the quarterdeck was 59 feet long. The JONES and her sisters were handsome steamers and looked very substantial or heavily-built, as opposed to some canallers which gave a much "lighter" appearance. She had a straight stem, a fully-topgallant forecastle, a half­ topgallant quarterdeck with a heavy counter stern, and her hull had a marked sheer. Her stockless anchors were tucked up into slotted pockets, but pul­ ling them up into pockets of that type sometimes was a difficult chore and photos show that the anchors were not always carried fully stowed. A series of very heavy rubbing strakes ran down the ship's sides to protect her plating from damage during docking and canalling manoeuvres. These rubbing strakes remained in place during the steamer's entire life. The JONES had a closed steel bulwark for most of the length of the fore­ castle head, with a straight steering pole at the stem. The texas house, containing the master's office and quarters, had a door and small window (later changed to a porthole) on each side, and four unusually large port­ holes across its face. On the bridge deck above, a large, squarish pilot­ house was sheltered by a solid steel bulwark which ran across the front of the deck and down its sides. Access to the bridge deck was via a companion- way on each side. The pilothouse had three large windows in its face, with two windows and a door in each side, as well as three windows in its back face. A sunvisor ran around the front and down the sides of the wheelhouse above the windows but well below the overhang of the cabin's roof. The mon­ key's island above was surrounded by an open pipe rail, and fitted there were a large searchlight, an emergency binnacle, and a life raft. The tall and fairly heavy pole foremast, which was nicely raked, rose out of the far aft end of the forecastle, immediately abaft the texas house. There was an open post-and-wire rail down either side of the spar deck, and an open rail at the forward end of the quarterdeck gave way to a closed steel taffrail which ran right around the fantail. The heavy steel after deckhouse, with boilerhouse at its forward end, did not at first have much of an overhang from above, but this later was changed, and the boat deck

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