Dora (sternwheeler)

Last updated
Dora (sternwheeler).png
Dora, somewhere on the Coquille River.
History
NameDora
OwnerMyrtle Point Transportation Company
BuilderHerman Bros., Randolph, Oregon
In service1910
Out of service1927
IdentificationU.S. 208076
FateAbandoned
General characteristics
TypeInland passenger/freight
Tonnage77 gross tons; 64 registered tons
Length70.3  ft (21.43  m)
Beam15.8  ft (4.82  m)
Deckstwo
Installed powerTwin steam engines, horizontally mounted, 55 indicated horsepower
PropulsionSternwheel

Dora was a sternwheel steamboat that was operated on the Coquille River on the southern coast of Oregon from 1912 to 1923. This vessel should not be confused with a number of other craft of the same name operating at the same time in other parts of North America.

Contents

Design and construction

Dora was built at Randolph, Oregon in 1910 by the Herman Brothers [1] The steamer was 70.3  ft (21.43  m ) long, with a beam of 15.8  ft (4.82  m ) and depth of hold of 4.1  ft (1.25  m ). [2] The overall size of the vessel was 77 gross and 64 registered tons. [2] Power was furnished by twin steam engines, each driving a pitman arm connected to a crankpin on the sternwheel, with 55 total indicated horsepower for both combined. Total required crew was shown as two. Dora was built for Russell Panter, who named the vessel after his daughter. [3] Panter was doing business as the Myrtle Point Transportation Company. [4]

Service and route

Dora was intended to be used for passenger service on the Coquille River. [1] Dora was placed on a route running from Bandon on the coast, to the county seat at Coquille and then upriver to Myrtle Point. [4] Dora served this route in conjunction with the smaller sternwheeler, Myrtle, also owned by the Myrtle Point Transportation Company. [4] Typical service included:

Competition with rival vessels

In 1915, Dora came into fierce competition with the gasoline launch Charm. There was a collision between Dora and Charm, and the captains of the vessels, Willard, of Dora, and Panter, of Charm, each claimed the collision was the other's fault. [7] Following the collision, the crews of the two vessels exchanged intemperate words, and someone was said to have thrown a gaspipe through a window on one of the vessels, while it was also claimed that someone had heaved a can of coal oil at the Dora. [7] Someone concerned about passenger safety contacted Sheriff Johnson, who in turn referred the matter to the Steamboat Inspection Service. [7] The inspectors instructed captains Willard and Panter to each submit written reports of the incident. [7]

On February 3, 1915, following a two-day trial before inspectors Edwards and Fuller, the U.S. Steamboat Inspection Service suspended, for 20 months each, the licenses of Captains Walter Panter and Allen Panter, as well as that of engineer Wm. Panter, all of the Myrtle Point Transportation Company, as well as the licenses of Capt. O. R. Willard and engineer Elmer Willard, both of the Coquille River Company. [8] Both the Panters and the Willards were barred from operating any vessel on the Coquille River or anywhere else. [8]

Loss of a crewman

On November 29, 1918, it was reported that Earl Randall, of Dundee, Oregon, a crewman on Dora, had been lost overboard during his course of duty and drowned. [9] The incident occurred on the Coquille River near Riverton while the vessel was steaming towards Coquille. [9] Randall was last seen walking through the engine room. [9] The next thing that was noticed was his cries for help as he came up to the surface of the river from underwater. [9] The vessel was reversed and a life ring was thrown, but it was too late. [9] Randall's body was recovered two hours later. [9]

Salvage of Myrtle

Dora abandoned, June 21, 1941. Dora (sternwheeler) abandoned 1941.png
Dora abandoned, June 21, 1941.

In February 1921, the small steamer Myrtle had sunk at a dock at Myrtle Point. [3] On board Myrtle was a cargo consisting of most of a rail car load of canned carrots. [3] Dora, then owned by the Panter family doing business as the Myrtle Point Transportation Company, was sent to Myrtle Point to aid in the salvage of Myrtle and the sunken vessel's cargo. [3]

Disposition

Dora was abandoned in 1927 along the bank of the Coquille River on the ranch of Paris Ward, one of the shareholders in the Myrtle Point Transportation Company. [1] [10]

See also

Notes

  1. 1 2 3 Newell, Gordon R., ed., H.W. McCurdy Marine History of the Pacific Northwest, Superior Publishing (1966), at pages 174 and 391.
  2. 1 2 U.S. Treasury Dept., Statistics Bureau, Annual List of Merchant Vessels (for year ending June 30, 1911), at page 166.
  3. 1 2 3 4 King, Chuck, Kirk, Linda, and Prola, Carolyn, Myrtle Creek and Vicinity: 1893-1950, Arcadia 2014, at page 27.
  4. 1 2 3 "News of Nearby Towns -- Plans New Boat", Coos Bay Times, September 2, 1913.
  5. ↑ "Pythian Sisters to Myrtle Point", Bandon Recorder, November 14, 1913, page 1, col. 4.
  6. ↑ "Myrtle Point Items", February 24, 1914, page 1, col. 2.[ clarification needed ]
  7. 1 2 3 4 "Steamboat Controversy May Be Brought to Head", Semi-Weekly Bandon Recorder, January 29, 1915, page 1, col. 6.
  8. 1 2 "Riverboat Men Get Vacations", Bandon Recorder, February 5, 1915, page 1, col. 6.
  9. 1 2 3 4 5 6 "Twenty Years Ago", Coquille Valley Sentinel, November 24, 1938, page 4, col. 4.
  10. ↑ Panter, William, "Early River Traffic on the Coquille," Glancing Back (Pioneer Lore), at 16-19, Vol. I, No. 1, Coos-Curry Pioneer and Historical Association, 1971

Related Research Articles

Steamboats of the Oregon Coast

The history of steamboats on the Oregon Coast begins in the late 19th century. Before the development of modern road and rail networks, transportation on the coast of Oregon was largely water-borne. This article focuses on inland steamboats and similar craft operating in, from south to north on the coast: Rogue River, Coquille River, Coos Bay, Umpqua River, Siuslaw Bay, Yaquina Bay, Siletz River, and Tillamook Bay. The boats were all very small, nothing like the big sternwheelers and propeller boats that ran on the Columbia River or Puget Sound. There were many of them, however, and they came to be known as the "mosquito fleet."

Steamboats of the Coquille River

The Coquille River starts in the Siskiyou National Forest and flows hundreds of miles through the Coquille Valley on its way to the Pacific Ocean. Bandon, Oregon, sits at the mouth of the Coquille River on the Pacific Ocean. Before the era of railroads and later, automobiles, the steamboats on the Coquille River were the major mode of transportation from Bandon to Coquille and Myrtle Point in southern Coos County, Oregon, United States.

Coos Bay Mosquito Fleet

The Coos Bay Mosquito Fleet comprised numerous small steamboats and motor vessels which operated in the late 19th and early 20th centuries on Coos Bay, a large and mostly shallow harbor on the southwest coast of the U.S. state of Oregon, to the north of the Coquille River valley. Coos Bay is the major harbor on the west coast of the United States between San Francisco and the mouth of the Columbia River.

<i>Altona</i> (sternwheeler)

The steamship Altona operated from 1890 to 1907 on the Willamette River in the U.S. state of Oregon. In 1907, she was transferred to Alaska.

<i>Otter</i> (sternwheeler)

Otter was a wooden sternwheel steamboat that was used in Puget Sound and briefly on the Columbia and Stikine rivers from 1874 to 1897.

<i>Grey Eagle</i> (sternwheeler)

Grey Eagle was a wooden sternwheel-driven steamboat that operated on the Willamette and Yamhill rivers in the United States from 1894 to 1930. In 1903 Grey Eagle became the last commercial steamboat to run upriver to Junction City, Oregon.

<i>Rainbow</i> (sternwheeler)

Rainbow was a sternwheel steamboat that was operated in the Coos Bay region of Oregon from 1912 to 1923. Rainbow is sometimes referred to as a "launch", meaning a small steamboat. This vessel's name is sometimes seen as Rain-Bow.

<i>Welcome</i> (sternwheeler) American steamboat

Welcome was a sternwheel steamboat that was operated on the Coquille River on the south Oregon coast from 1900 to 1907.

<i>Myrtle</i> (sternwheeler) Steamboat

Myrtle was a steamboat built in 1909 for service on the Coquille River and its tributaries, in Oregon. The ability of this small vessel to reach remote locations on the river system was cited many years later as evidence in support of the important legal concept of navigability.

<i>Coquille</i> (steamboat)

Coquille was a steamboat built in 1908 for service on the Coquille River and its tributaries. Coquille served as a passenger vessel from 1908 to 1916, when the boat was transferred to the lower Columbia River. Coquille was reconstructed into a log boom towing boat, and served in this capacity from 1916 to 1935 or later.

<i>Echo</i> (1901 sternwheeler)

Echo was a sternwheel steamboat that was operated on the Coquille River on the Southern Oregon Coast from 1901 to 1910.

<i>Liberty</i> (sternwheeler)

Liberty was a sternwheel steamboat that was operated on the Coquille River and then on Coos Bay from 1903 to 1918. Liberty was notable for having its ownership entangled in various legal claims in the early 1910s, including some involving a colorful North Bend, Oregon business promoter Lorenzo Dow "Major" Kinney (1855-1920).

<i>Antelope</i> (steamboat)

Antelope was a steamboat that was operated on the Coquille River and on Coos Bay on the southern Oregon coast from 1886 to about 1908. Antelope was a versatile boat, which served in various roles, including passenger transport, barge towing, and as a fisheries tender.

<i>Dispatch</i> (sternwheeler)

Dispatch was a sternwheel steamboat that was operated on the Coquille River on the southern Oregon coast from 1903 to 1920. The name of this vessel is sometimes seen spelled Despatch. This sternwheeler should not be confused with an earlier and somewhat smaller sternwheeler, also named Dispatch, that was built at Bandon, Oregon, in 1890, for which the 1903 Dispatch was a replacement.

<i>Telegraph</i> (1914 sternwheeler)

Telegraph was a sternwheel steamboat that was operated on the Coquille River on the southern Oregon coast from 1914 to 1927. Telegraph is perhaps best known for having been in involved in collisions with rival steamboats, apparently as a result of fierce competition for business on the Coquille River.

<i>Favorite</i> (steamboat)

Favorite was a small steamboat that was operated on the Coquille River, Coos Bay and on the Siuslaw River, in the southern Oregon coast region from 1900 to 1918.

<i>Wolverine</i> (motor vessel)

Wolverine was a launch powered by a gasoline engine that operated on the Coquille River on the southern coast of Oregon, United States, from 1908 to the 1920s. Later the boat operated on Coos Bay, and, in the mid-1930s, was transferred to Eureka, California. Wolverine is principally known for its early service as a high-speed passenger vessel.

<i>Little Annie</i> (steamboat)

Little Annie was a sternwheel-driven steamboat that operated on the Coquille River on the Southern Oregon Coast from 1876 to 1890. This steamer should not be confused with a number of other vessels with the same name operating at about the same time in various parts of the United States.

<i>La Center</i> (sternwheeler)

La Center was a small stern-wheel steamboat that operated from 1912 to 1931, mostly on the Lewis and Lake rivers in southwest Washington, on a route to and from Portland, Oregon along the lower Columbia and lower Willamette rivers.

Callendar Navigation Company

The Callendar Navigation Company, sometimes seen as the Callendar Transportation Company, started in business in the early 1900s. Callendar was formed in the early 1900s, and was based in Astoria, Oregon. Callender was to become one of six large towing companies of the Columbia and Willamette rivers in the early decades of the 1900s, the others being Shaver Transportation, Smith Transportation, Hosford, Knappton Towing Co., and Willamette and Columbia River Towing Co. In 1922, Callendar Navigation merged with Knappton Towboat Co., which existed, with a name change in 1990, and which became part of Foss Marine in 1993.

References

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.