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TELESCOPE Page 64 OM TIE EK SRO a Three of the Leatham-Smith products line up for this picture in Sturgeon Bay, c1930. At dock is the J. E. Savage, along with the Sinola and Fontana representing three different operating companies. an enterprising Sturgeon Bay man. . .Lea- tham D. Smith. . .designed a method of taking older, unprofitable bulk carriers, and inex- pensively converting them to the self-unloader type. In addition to adding to the convenience of being able to serve small dock owners in the receipt of his own stone business pro- ducts, the plan eventually was responsible for extending the life of marginal ore carriers that may have otherwise been disposed of. It is unlikely that anyone at the time would have imagined the impact that the design eventually would have. Leatham D. Smith was an engineer who had a small shipyard in Sturgeon Bay, as well as many other associated business ventures. Among them was a stone quarry. He owned and operated a small fleet of vessels in co- operation with A. E. R. Schneider of Cleveland, through the Cleveland Cliffs Steamship Co. He apparently liked the idea of the self- unloader mechanism for handling his own stone products, and some time in the early 1920s devised a conversion design that was rather unlike those employed on any other self-unloading vessel on the Great Lakes. What Smith designed came to be known as the "scraper-type" self-unloader, with a steam-powered system of tunnels, scrapers, elevators and the swinging boom. The main selling point was a relatively inexpensive conversion of older vessels, and their ability to service smaller ports on the Lakes. Over a dozen conversions came out of Sturgeon Bay in the late 1920s, all similar in nature. Each of the conversions was accom- plished on vessels basically about 400 feet in length. The largest of the conversions was the Sierra, operated by Tomlinson inte- rests at the time. She was 461 feet in length. For some reason, there were no more of these steam-operated conversions after 1930. The later conversions followed the traditional design of continuous belts and hoppers in the holds, all of which were done elsewhere, not at Sturgeon Bay. In operation, the Smith vessels were joys to ship watchers, since they had a penchant for making noise, smoke and steam. The steam-powered unloading system rattled and scraped, while the steam hissed noisily in billows from the stack along with clouds MILWAUKEE PUBLIC LIBRARY