_{The long lived Iroquois, in her final incarnation as a bizarre-looking freight boat. Colorized by/from the collection of the author.}

BUILT/REBUILT: 1901/1928, Craig Shipyards, Toledo, OH/Lake Washington Shipyard, Houghton, WA.

OFFICIAL NUMBER: 100730 SIGNAL LETTERS: KVSB/KJNK (1933)

L/B/D: 214 x 34 x 15 (as built; 214 x 49 x 15 in 1928) PASSENGERS/AUTOS: 400-day passengers, 160 night passengers in 53 cabins/40-50 cars

NAME TRANSLATION: From the Iroquois tribe, also known as the Haudenosaunee, and to themselves, the Goano’ganoch’sa’jeh’seroni or Ganonsyon.  A historically powerful important Native American people who formed the Iroquois Confederacy, a league of five (six after 1722) the Five Nations and Five Nations of the Iroquois distinct nations. The name means “Heart people, people of God.”

FINAL DISPOSITION: Scuttled, 1982. 

HISTORY

A trio of passenger steamers moved from the Great Lakes for service on Puget Sound: the Chippewa (covered elsewhere on the site as she served as a Washington State Ferry late in her career), the Iroquois and the Indianapolis.      

The Iroquois was built in 1901, a 214-foot coal-burning passenger liner with two large, raked funnels. Proving unprofitable on the Lakes, she was sold to Puget Sound Navigation and arrived from her journey around South America in 1907. PSN was quick to rebuild her as an oil-burner, then assigned her to the Victoria run.

In the years leading up to the World War I, the Iroquois and Chippewa tried to give the Canadian Pacific Railroad steamships a run for the money on the Victoria-Seattle route.   The CPR ships were faster, and a rate war began, with PSN dropping their prices to an unheard-of low rate. Though the Iroquois was very popular, PSN couldn’t really match the service offered by CPR and eventually quit trying, concentrating more on service on Puget Sound.

WWI put the vessels in layup, with the Chippewa becoming a training vessel.  By the end of the war, both vessels were languishing at the pier, a victim of the growing need for auto carriers on the Sound. Black Ball Transport, an independent subsidiary of PSN, purchased the Iroquois with the intent of using her to haul freight between Seattle, Port Townsend, Port Angeles and Victoria.   BBT sent the ferry into the yard to be rebuilt in 1954.

_{Rebuild to carry cars, and as the well-fitted out “Night Boat” from Seattle to Victoria, the Iroquois proved immediately popular. Author’s collection.}

The refit to the old steamer was extensive. Her staterooms were removed, and the Ladies’ Lounge moved from the stern to the bow to become the wheelhouse. Her troublesome steam engines were removed and replaced with diesel engines.

The flat, bizarre looking vessel that emerged from the yards in 1954 looked nothing like the trim passenger steamer she had been built as. Still, the ever-dependable Iroquois chugged up and down the Sound, becoming a familiar sight to people for the next two decades.

After spending several years mothballed, Black Ball Transport sold the old vessel off to interests in Alaska.  She was used as a processing vessel for the next ten years until at the age of 80 the old boat was simply worn out. The ferry was disposed of by her owners by being intentionally sunk in the cold, deep waters of the Gulf of Alaska in 1982.