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The Harbor Line |
Remembering the Winslow The summer of 1999 brings near-record low water levels to the Great Lakes, and with them constant headaches for the maritime industry. Groundings, delays and reduced payloads top the complaint list, but that’s only the beginning of it. Recreational boaters in many areas of the lower Lakes (no pun intended) can’t even use docks and launch ramps that are now too far removed from the water’s edge to be functional or safe.
The burned-out hull of the 220-foot Winslow lies just south of Minnesota Power’s Hibbard Power Plant, about 300 feet off the end of Main Street in West Duluth. It’s been there for more than 90 years, largely hidden from view. To understand the meaning of the old hulk you have to go back to the very beginnings of Duluth as a city. In the years following the Civil War, there was rampant speculation about mineral lands in the Lake Superior district, and mining communities around Marquette and the Keweenaw Peninsula were enjoying rapid growth. The communities at the head of the Lakes had only a few settlers in crude shacks, and it was not until 1871 that prosperity came to Duluth in the form of the Lake Superior & Mississippi Railroad. The railroad brought with it Duluth’s first grain elevator and soon afterward the Duluth Ship Canal. Then settlers flooded into town. To take advantage of the immigration to Lake Superior in the 1860s, the Lake Superior Transit Company was organized by several Buffalo and Detroit ship owners, and the new steamer Winslow, built in 1863, was one of their best boats. Literally thousands of Wisconsin, Minnesota, Dakota and Iowa families used the ships of this fleet to migrate across the continent. Winslow and some 20 near-sisters called at Duluth’s Northern Pacific docks for the next 30 years, heavily laden with passengers, baggage, manufactured goods, livestock and a rich variety of foodstuffs. The same ships took away cargoes of wheat and flour for Buffalo. Each of the “propellers” carried about 80 passengers in cabins or 250 in steerage accommodations, plus some 1,000 tons of freight in the cargo holds below decks. The Winslow ended her long career when she ran aground in an earlymorning fog at 47th Avenue East in Duluth on October 2, 1891. She ran right up on the rocks, stoving a hole in her bow. The ship was lightered of a portion of her cargo and floated free later in the same day, and she was brought into the harbor to discharge the remainder of her freight at the NP docks. On the afternoon of October 3, however, the big wooden ship burst into flames, reportedly the result of water seeping into lime in her hold. Some of the ship’s pumps were engaged fighting leaks from her recent grounding, so she did not have enough pumping capacity to fight the fire adequately. The result was that the once-proud liner was reduced to a heap of twisted iron in a couple of hours. The wreck of the Winslow was a seri ous obstruction in Duluth harbor until it was ordered removed by the Corps of Engineers in 1908. Salvager John Wanless pumped out the hulk of the old ship and towed it up the St. Louis River, where it was scuttled in shallow water in its present location. The harbor is full of stories, virtually wherever some bit of wood sticks out of its waters. This is a place steeped in history, with reminders everywhere of native history, Voyageurs and fur traders, commercial fishermen, lumbermen and pioneers of every stripe. Pat Labadie is director of Lake Superior Maritime Visitor Center. Picture: Steamer WINSLOW damaged her bow when she ran on Duluth’s rocky shore in 1891 fog. |
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In the Twin Ports, shallow areas of the harbor have been uncovered that
have not been seen in many years, including remnants of long-forgotten
docks and ships. In the upper reaches of the harbor, for instance, below Grassy
Point, lie stone-filled cribs and mountains of wooden slabs from turn-of-the-century sawmills, long rows of pilings from the old Soo Line
ore docks, the remains of several tugs and dredges burned in the famous
1918 Cloquet fire and the bones of the liner Winslow.
