Captain Peabody had pulled the same trick nearly twenty years earlier: taking the hull of a vessel, stripping it down, and completely rebuilding it into a completely new ferry. When he did this in 1935 the vessel that emerged was the Kalakala, a vessel whose function as a ferry had always been secondary to its use as the symbolic flagship/excursion vessel–though up until the 60’s, she worked pretty well as a ferryboat as well. In Read more…
They have run the gamut, from elegant dining rooms that wouldn’t have looked out of place on a trans-Atlantic ocean liner (the pocket liners operated by Canadian Pacific) to the galleys fitted out with surplus plastic fast food restaurant fittings (the original Issaquah Class galleys.) Black Ball ran all over the place, from the elegant fittings in the Rosario and Quilcene to the large, but utilitarian lunch counter on the Enetai and Willapa. Washington State Read more…
The Elwha pulling into San Francisco on her journey northward in 1968. Note the lower car deck windows are boarded up and the false bow (left end of photo) to break waves. Author’s photo. Going nowhere fast Debacle–noun– A sudden, disastrous collapse, downfall, or defeat; a rout; A total, often ludicrous failure;The breaking up of ice in a river. Okay, I admit I didn’t know about that last definition (files it away for future use) Read more…
We have a final design! This is how the new as-yet-unnamed class of ferries will look. And again, please no “Electric Olympics” or something lame like that. They different enough from the Olympics (which, I’m sorry, for me when I hear “Olympic Class” I’m always going to think of the White Star Line trip of Olympic, Titanic and Britannic. Sorry, but White Star got there first.) I suppose you could name the class after the Read more…
Over at WSF What’s that old saying? The more things change, the more they stay the same? WSF did the same thing several years ago when tendering the bids for the new hybrid electric ferries. This led to delays and a change in the law to bid the contract out nationwide. Well, the good news is, we FINALLY are out to bid. WSF is hoping multiple yards bid so we can get two boats by Read more…
To diesel or not to diesel… That is the question. While the Seattle Times editorial board and even several of the candidates for governor are calling for at least two diesel Olympic Class ferries to be built while we wait for the first hybrid electric ferries to appear, there’s a real problem with that, as the new head of the ferry system points out. The previous providers of the propulsion system for the Olympics, seemingly Read more…
Indianapolis, the smallest of the three Great Lakes steamers was the first to arrive on Puget Sound, arriving at Port Townsend 10 February 1906. She has been fitted with temporary sails to assist her trip via the Strait of Magellan, as there was no Panama Canal to utilize. The Puget Sound Navigation Company, owner of the steamer, put her on the Seattle-Port Townsend-Victioria run, but with the arrival of her larger near sisters, the Indianapolis Read more…
No vessel went through such transformation as the Iroquois. With a career that lasted 83 years, that’s probably not a surprise, but the various guises the vessel took on over the years ranged from one boxy, somewhat inelegant rebuild to a transfiguration into one of the weirdest looking vessels on Puget Sound–or anywhere, for that matter. The Puget Sound Navigation Company, not yet having reclaimed the “Black Ball Line” name, purchased three Great Lakes steamers Read more…
…or de-evolution depending on how you view the metamorphosis from the Napa Valley to the ferry Malahat. Built as the flagship vessel for the Monticello Steamship company, the Napa Valley went into service in 1910 on the thirty-mile trip between San Francisco and Vallejo. She was to be a modern and forward-thinking vessel for the time, for in addition to the 1,500 passengers she was designed to carry, the steamer also had room for about Read more…
I’ve always been fond of this little ferry.She started life in 1923 as the steam powered ferry Whidby for the Whidby Island Transit company, then a subsidiary of PSN, and soon to be totally absorbed by the company, for routes on and around Whidbey Island. She worked in this capacity for nearly a decade before Black Ball pulled her out of service with a very definite idea for upgrading the little vessel in 1931 for Read more…