Chapter 5: Mastery of the Inland Seas

Industry without transportation is simply routine by which day-to-day needs are supplied. Then come a few decorative objects to satisfy the urge for self-expression in art, which is the soul of the people. The Navajo Indians made their blankets and pottery for their own pleasure rather than for trade. But white men have always been rovers. The early settlers of the Western Reserve had more than domestic ambitions. The inheritance of the English and French traditions of commercial adventure moved them to a conquest of the Great Lakes.

The first sail-boat to part the waters of Lake Erie was the “Griffin,” built near Buffalo by La Salle. The voyager of Rouen directed the practical construction of the “Griffin.” Father Louis Hennepin kept alive the faith and enthusiasm of their fellow explorers and the Indian helpers. The “Griffin” was launched in the Spring of 1679. It was of forty-five ton burden and armed with five cannon.

The “Griffin” touched at Detroit, Mackinac and at Green Bay, and loaded with a rich cargo of furs, started on its return trip. La Salle and his leaders had left the boat, continuing their explorations. The famous “Griffin” and its rich cargo never reached its haven.

For centuries, the Indians in their canoes had carried on primitive barter along the edges of the lakes. But no Indian had ever summoned courage to go straight across. To the awe of the Redskins, the white navigators in their sturdy French bateaux propelled by a crew of paddlers, went directly across the lakes.

In 1808, Major Carter launched a schooner lightly dubbed the “Zephyr,” which she certainly was not. The “Zephyr” carried thirty tons and made regular trips with furs, grindstones, salt, merchandise and iron between Buffalo, Cleveland, and Detroit — the present route of the floating hostelries of the Cleveland and Buffalo and the Detroit and Cleveland lines.

Levi Johnson, the Sir Christopher Wren of Cleveland’s architects and builders, who constructed the first courthouse, the first frame house in the city and many of the early office structures, built the “Pilot” in a yard at the site of the present Opera House. Johnson’s craft was hauled to the river with much urging and straining by twenty-eight oxen.

In the libraries of men who have a passion for the sea and a fervent love for the shapely ships that won victories over great waters, there are models of the clippers developed after the War of 1812. These three-masted boats were trim and speedy, with well-turned bows and broad sterns. Some of the most famous carried five masts and were of two thousand five hundred tons. These glorious swift sailors were of white oak, the deck-house and spars being of pine. Michigan’s straightest timber went into their masts. And it is token of the affection of their masters for these sailing boats that many of them were christened with feminine names. Thomas Quayle was the most eminent boat designer of the time.

With the depletion of the forests and the introduction of the steam, the most romantic full-rigged craft were banished from our water-ways. They live in the memories of the old marine men and in the admiration of youthful readers of adventure tales. The first steam-boat to put in at the Cleveland harbor was the famous “Walk-in-the-Water,” named for a friendly Indian who was an advisor of the pioneers of Buffalo.

On the first day of September, 1818, the people of Cleveland gathered on the bluff overlooking the lake to watch this curious craft approach the town. The “Walk-in-the-Water” made eight to ten miles per hour. Cord-wood, piled high on the deck, supplied its fuel. Inspired by this steam-propelled boat, Johnson constructed the “Enterprise” in 1824. The “Enterprise” was luxuriously fitted, so the Western Reservists though, the cabins were for passengers.

By 1830 there were five passenger boats plying between Buffalo, Cleveland, and Detroit. Aside from the fact that the side-wheelers had a fire or explosion occasionally, they were fairly safe and moderately comfortable. Some folk preferred to ride horse-back from Buffalo to Cleveland rather than risk the trip on this “devilish contraption.” The fear was expressed that a side-wheeler might lose one of its wheels and the boat turn on its side.

The first boat bearing the proud name “City of Cleveland” was built in 1837. The “City of Cleveland” had a steam whistle and was superior to the other craft on the lake in that she could vent her emotions. The lordly “Empire” was another side-wheeler of great fame. The cabins were furnished in the gaudy American empire style of decoration. The “Empire” advertised a cuisine under the direction of a chef, and also bands and entertainment. And we call the cabaret a novelty! The “Empire” destroys out illusions.

We who live among the softer indulgences of life are stirred by tales of hardship and endurance. We are thrilled by the stories of the early side-wheelers whose decks and cabins were battered by the cord-wood, which shifted in the relentless storms. The graceful side-wheels gave way to hidden propellers. Many of the old boats were newly equipped.

Then railroads came, and the passenger traffic by boat lost favor. Iron, coal, copper and grain became the chief cargoes of the lake boats. From the ’70s on, the commerce of the “landlocked seas” grew in volume, until it can now be said that Liverpool receives less tonnage in a year than Cleveland.

The mighty achievement of the lake freighter can best be pictured in contrasts. The brig “Columbia” brought one hundred and thirty tons of ore from Marquette in 1855. Today “Le Land De Graff” brings fourteen thousand tons of ore and returns to Superior with two hundred cars of coal. This tremendous cargo is put abroad the freighter in less than two hours — in the time one spends at the matinee.

The magic coal-loading machines were made and developed in Cleveland’s shops. A freighter arrives in Cleveland from Duluth in five days — a distance of a thousand miles. Coal is exchanged for iron ore or perhaps grain. Fourteen thousand tons of ore are dumped into the boat in less than two hours or four hundred and twenty-two thousand bushels of wheat are loaded.

In the infancy of Cleveland’s shipping, it took four days to load three hundred tons. Stagings were then built inside the holds of the old freighters and ore shoveled by hand to the platform and then to the dock. A week was consumed in unloading three hundred tons.

Now, the huge claws of the mammoth unloaders of the lakes pile twelve thousand tons of ore on the docks in three hours. The ore unloaders, miracles of invention, were evolved by Hulett, Brown and McMyler, Cleveland men. These machines have made it possible for the Lake Erie pots to handle a tonnage exceeding that of all the ports of France.

Four out of five of the steel lake freighters are Cleveland owned. The father of the iron carrying lines was the Cleveland Iron company, organized in 1849 by Samuel Mather, Senior, and his friends. In 1870, the Great Lakes boasted three iron freighters. Today there is a fleet of more than six hundred steel ships carrying the world’s largest cargo of iron and ore.

Let us here pay tribute to Captain Henry Coffinberry and James Wallace who organized the Globe Shipbuilding Company. These men believed that a steel ship would float, contrary to the ideas of the old shipbuilders, who affirmed that only timber would keep above water. Coffinberry and Wallace organized the Cleveland Shipbuilding company, acquiring drydocks, ways and shops. The first steel freighter was the the steamer “Onoko.” This boat earned enough silver to fill its hold before the prophecy of the old shipbuilders came to pass and the waters closed over its decks.

Today the passenger ships have regained the popularity of yore. The “See-and-Bee” and its companions are floating town-houses with drawing rooms that rival the salons of Euclid Avenue. Going from Cleveland to Buffalo is like walking through foyers and restaurants of a hotel or club. Little resemblance is there to the water washed decks of the “Griffin.”