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Alva Bradley was born on November 27, 1814 at Ellington, Connecticut. His family moved to Brownhelm, in Lorain County, in 1823. At the age of 19, he shipped on board the schooner Liberty, and by 1839 took over command of the schooner Commodore Lawrence. In 1841 he sank money in his first building venture, the schooner South America. This began a long association with Vermilion shipyards which lasted until 1868, at which time he shifted his shipbuilding interests to Cleveland. Captain Bradley died there on November 28, 1885. The third member of the triumvirate that financed the shipyard in Vermilion after Goodsell's departure was Philip Minch. He was born at Blankenheim, Hessen-Cassel, Germany, on May 14, 1820. There he learned the trade of a shoemaker. He came to this country in 1841 and proceeded immediately to Vermilion where he set up shop in his acquired trade. In 1842 he financed the building of the scow Linden, of which he took command. In the early 1850's, he began to invest in Vermilion-built vessels, along with Bradley and Nicholas. Minch built up large holdings in vessel interests. He later moved to Cleveland where he died on June 20, 1887. Some of the best-known schooners on the lakes came from the shipyard operated by Nicholas and Parsons. Among them were the C. C. Griswold (1855), A. Bradley (1857), S. H. Kimball (1861), J. F. Card, (1864), Charles P. Minch (1867), and Anna P. Grover (1868). Nicholas continued to build ships at Vermilion until 1873, after which he moved to Cleveland. Other names that appear are Henry Lutz, Peter Crosier, and P. M. Brush. In all probability they either invested money in some of the vessels or they may have been employed as ship carpenters in the Vermilion yard. For all practical purposes, when the Bradley-Minch interests were diverted to Cleveland, shipbuilding came to an end at Vermilion. Huron At one time the east bank of the mouth of the Huron River was largely marshland. As a result, the early shipyards in Huron were built along the west bank. Today the sites are covered by fisheries. Huron was best known in the 1830's for the sidewheelers that were built there. This was largely because Fairbanks Church had moved from Black River to Huron. In the early days of shipping there was great rivalry between lake ports for trade. This was particularly true of Huron and Sandusky in 1826. The few steamboats on Lake Erie refused to stop at Huron, the captains 54