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D & C STANDS for the line of steamers which carry a larger number of passengers than any other lake passenger line, and the entire fleet is the product of the Detroit Dry Dock Company. The navigation company engaged the young naval architect, previously mentioned, to design a 1,200 ton side-wheel passenger steamer for them in 1877 and he suggested leasing the Wyandotte yard to build in. This first passenger steamer was composite, and it is a fact that the Detroit Dry Dock Company is the only successful builder of composite vessels on the lakes. There is considerable significance in the fact that the Harvey H. Brown, built for E. M. Peck, an early lake ship builder and a long-headed and shrewd vessel owner, was ordered sheathed with wood, or made composite. It is not generally known that the representative of one of the largest inspection societies in the world has designed a composite boat for lake service. Indications would point to a revival in the building of the composite type of vessels. This first work of great importance at the Wyandotte yard, the building of the City of Detroit, the composite steamer, was for the D. & C. S. N. Company's passenger line, which was composed, at that time, of the famous R. N. Rice, also built at Detroit. This was in 1877, and up to this time thirty wooden vessels had been built at the yard in Detroit. This was at the rate of about three a year, and many of these thirty vessels are still in commission. Among them are the steamers S. C. Baldwin, the first double-decked vessel built on the lakes, and the Gordon Campbell, still rating A2. The Jos. L. Hurd and the Inter-Ocean are also in this list, as well as the tugs Champion, Niagara, Merrick and John Owen, and barges Emma L. Coyne, Sweetheart and Delaware. The schooners L. S. Hammond, Reindeer, Monticcllo and Michigan are early products of this company. Work was continued at the Wyandotte Yard, and the Queen of the Lakes, of 100 tons, was the next vessel launched. She was followed by a 20-mile an hour steam yacht, used on the Mississippi river for a mail steamer. The third vessel was wooden but was sheathed with iron, and was built on order from Ludington parties.