The steamboat Keenora was built in 1897 for passenger and cargo traffic along the Ontario's Lake of the Woods, where she ran successfully for over a decade, serving isolated communities on the lake as distant as Rainy River. When the Ontario and Rainy River Railway was built in 1901 traffic volumes began to decline, following the takeover of this railway by Canadian Northern Railway in 1915, the vessel was sold to a consortium of Winnipeg lawyers. Keenora was dismantled and transported in sections to Winnipeg on railroad flatcars in 1917.
Once reassembled in Winnipeg, she received an additional 30-foot (9.1m) extension to her hull, increasing her overall length to 158 feet (48m). For a season the ship served as a floating dance hall in downtown Winnipeg, but was later assigned to cargo and passenger traffic on Lake Winnipeg and the Red River. A total of 65 passenger cabins were constructed, and a new machinery was installed. The machinery guaranteed a speed of 15 knots (28km/h; 17mph).
The regular route started from Winnipeg, with a turnaround point located at the northern end of Lake Winnipeg, at Warren Landing on the Big Mossy Point. From Warren Landing the passengers and cargo were transferred to a smaller steamboat, which covered the last 30 kilometres (19mi) to Norway House. Keenora was too large to enter the shallow Nelson River.
Keenora's career ended in the 1960s when she could not meet the new maritime regulations. At first the ship was destined to be scrapped, but was salvaged to be the cornerstone of Marine Museum of Manitoba's collections.
A steamboat is a boat that is propelled primarily by steam power, typically driving propellers or paddlewheels. The term steamboat is used to refer to small steam-powered vessels working on lakes, rivers, and in short-sea shipping. The development of the steamboat led to the larger steamship, which is a seaworthy and often ocean-going ship.
The Canadian Northern Railway (CNoR) was a historic Canadian transcontinental railway. At its 1923 merger into the Canadian National Railway, the CNoR owned a main line between Quebec City and Vancouver via Ottawa, Winnipeg, and Edmonton.
A riverboat is a watercraft designed for inland navigation on lakes, rivers, and artificial waterways. They are generally equipped and outfitted as work boats in one of the carrying trades, for freight or people transport, including luxury units constructed for entertainment enterprises, such as lake or harbour tour boats. As larger water craft, virtually all riverboats are especially designed and constructed, or alternatively, constructed with special-purpose features that optimize them as riverine or lake service craft, for instance, dredgers, survey boats, fisheries management craft, fireboats and law enforcement patrol craft.
SS Colvile was a Lake Winnipeg steamboat built for the Hudson's Bay Company in Grand Forks, Dakota Territory. Colvile was constructed, using some parts of the vessel called Chief Commissioner which in turn used a boiler taken from Anson Northup. Colvile was one of the largest vessels constructed for the HBC. The company hired Captain J. Reeves to supervise the construction of the vessel.
The Red River Trails were a network of ox cart routes connecting the Red River Colony and Fort Garry in British North America with the head of navigation on the Mississippi River in the United States. These trade routes ran from the location of present-day Winnipeg in the Canadian province of Manitoba across the Canada–United States border, and thence by a variety of routes through what is now the eastern part of the Dakotas and across western and central Minnesota to Mendota and Saint Paul, Minnesota on the Mississippi.
The Marine Museum of Manitoba, at Selkirk, Manitoba, was established in 1972 to gather ships, artifacts, and items relating to shipping, to tell the story of the development and the operation of transportation on Lake Winnipeg and the Red River. The period covered by the museum's displays starts circa 1850 and continues to present day.
SS Princess was a steamboat that operated on Lake Winnipeg in Canada from 1881 until 1906. The vessel was built in Winnipeg, Manitoba by the Jarvis & Burridge shipyard, and it was regarded as the pride of Lake Winnipeg and as the finest lake steamer west from the Great Lakes and east from the Rocky Mountains. The vessel has a total of 40 spacious passenger cabins, and outwardly it resembled many of the Mississippi River paddle steamers. The vessel had a top speed of approximately 25 knots.
Bonnington was a sternwheel steamboat that ran on the Arrow Lakes in British Columbia from 1911 to 1931. Bonnington and two sisterships were the largest sternwheelers ever built in British Columbia. Bonnington was partially dismantled in the 1950s, and later sank, making the vessel the largest freshwater wreck site in British Columbia.
Many steamboats operated on the Columbia River and its tributaries, in the Pacific Northwest region of North America, from about 1850 to 1981. Major tributaries of the Columbia that formed steamboat routes included the Willamette and Snake rivers. Navigation was impractical between the Snake River and the Canada–US border, due to several rapids, but steamboats also operated along the Wenatchee Reach of the Columbia, in northern Washington, and on the Arrow Lakes of southern British Columbia.
The history of commercial passenger shipping on the Great Lakes is long but uneven. It reached its zenith between the mid-19th century and the 1950s. As early as 1844, palace steamers carried passengers and cargo around the Great Lakes. By 1900, fleets of relatively luxurious passenger steamers plied the waters of the lower lakes, especially the major industrial centres of Chicago, Milwaukee, Detroit, Cleveland, Buffalo, and Toronto.
The Rossland was a sternwheel steamboat that ran on the Arrow Lakes in British Columbia. It was named after Rossland, British Columbia, once a prosperous mining town in the region.
Lytton was a sternwheel steamboat that ran on the Arrow Lakes and the Columbia River in southeastern British Columbia and northeastern Washington from 1890 to 1904.
CGS Bradbury is a retired fisheries patrol vessel for the federal Department of Transport's Marine Services, constructed in 1915. The vessel was sold to commercial interests in 1935. The ship was removed from service in 1973 and became a museum ship on static display at the Marine Museum of Manitoba.
Gwendoline was a sternwheel steamer that operated on the Kootenay River in British Columbia and northwestern Montana from 1893 to 1898. The vessel was also operated briefly on the Columbia River in the Columbia Valley.
Marion was a small sternwheel steamboat that operated in several waterways in inland British Columbia from 1888 to 1901.
From 1886 to 1920, steamboats ran on the upper reaches of the Columbia and Kootenay in the Rocky Mountain Trench, in western North America. The circumstances of the rivers in the area, and the construction of transcontinental railways across the trench from east to west made steamboat navigation possible.
The MS Lord Selkirk II was a passenger cruise ship that sailed the Red River and Lake Winnipeg in Manitoba, Canada. Lake Winnipeg's last cruise ship, she was the largest ever built between the Great Lakes and the Rockies, with accommodation for 130 passengers and 40 crew. She was 176 feet long with a 41 foot beam.
SS Midland City was originally a Canadian side-wheel steamboat that provided passenger and cargo transportation on the Great Lakes from 1871 until 1955. Originally named Maud, then America, she underwent several extensive refits over her 84-year service, and saw several owners. The ship was intentionally run aground and burnt to the waterline in 1955 near the mouth of the Wye River in Midland Bay. The wreck is intact and visible above the water to this day, where it acts as a breakwater for the Wye Heritage Marina and local attraction.
SS Okanagan was a steamship owned and operated by the Canadian Pacific Railway Lake and River Service. The vessel was constructed in 1906 at Okanagan Landing and launched in 1907, becoming Okanagan Lake's second steamship. She linked the transportation hubs at both the north and south ends of Okanagan Lake (Vernon and Penticton, respectively, aiding the development of interior British Columbia with other steamships of the 1900s. The ship was retired in 1934 and sold for scrap and spare parts. Only the Stern Saloon, a room in the back of the upper deck, remains. It was moved to the SS Sicamous Heritage Park in Penticton in 2002, to undergo restoration work.
SS Aberdeen was a steamship commissioned by Canadian Pacific Railway company. It was the first CPR steamship on Okanagan Lake and carried passengers and cargo from Okanagan Landing to Penticton from 1893 to 1919. Aberdeen connected communities along Okanagan Lake for the first time, creating a new era in the Okanagan Valley and greatly aiding the economy and settlement of the interior of British Columbia.
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