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TELESCOPE Page 144 the Beaver and Fox Islands of Lake Michigan. As a result of the collision, four men were to have died in the accident. Not to cast doubt upon the previous writers, but I believe the accident never occurred. The Dows generated quite a bit of copy for the newspapers of the day, and an event of such magnitude would have surely been reported. In reviewing the newspaper accounts of the time period, I could find no mention of the collision. Not satisfied with the results of my search, I enlisted the aid of the Marine Historical Collection of the Milwaukee Public Library. According to their sources no mention of such a collision was found. The Library further checked with Mr. Walter Hirthe, the curator of the Wisconsin Marine Historical Society and could find no mention of such a collision. Further search and inquiry was made with the Milwaukee Sentinel index from 1880 to 1890 and the United States Lifesaving Service Logs from 1881 to 1887 and still no mention of such a collision. The Institute for Great Lakes Research in Bowling Green could find no record of such a collision. How such mis- information becomes so widely reported and quoted is beyond belief. However, a common thread running through all of the material is that the season of 1883 saw the Dows reduced to a tow barge. It was stated that the masts were removed and the Dows towed through the Lakes. This is further substantiated by Captain John Thurston who reported seeing her discarded yards on Carrington & Casey's wharf in Toledo. It was at this point in her career that Captain Skeldon left the Dows for another command. The next mention of the Dows was in 1885 as a part of the Wilson Fleet. Her primary pur- pose was taking coal from Lake Erie ports to Duluth and returning with iron ore from Two Harbors. The Dows once again found the bottom at the Lime Kiln Crossing, and in doing so was the cause of an international incident. The Dows while in tow of the propeller George Spencer ran up on the rocks that were the result of ongoing dredging of the channel. It was stated that she was on the rocks 18 inches, 100 feet on the Canadian side of the channel. According to Canadian Law, only Canadian tugs could free the Dows from her grounding. As the American tugs A.J. Smith, Stranger and Shanghraun arrived at the scene so did the Collector of Canadian Customs. The problem was finally resolved by a decision from the Minister of Customs in > The DAVID DOWS with the tug WINSLOW as depicted by marine artist Thomas Chilvers.