Today is the 50th anniversary of the last voyage of the Hudson River Day Line steamboat Alexander Hamilton. Her last sail on Monday, September 6, 1971 - also Labor Day - marked the end of an era. 

Built in 1924 by the Bethlehem Shipbuilding Corporation for the Hudson River Day Line, she was one of the last of the Hudson River sidewheel steamboats to be built. Originally plying the Hudson River between New York City and Albany, by the 1950s her route was reduced to Poughkeepsie, and by 1970 to Bear Mountain. The Hudson River Day Line had been previously purchased by the Circle Line, who continued to operate it as a separate institution, but in 1971 the Circle Line ended steamboat service to Bear Mountain, replacing the Hamilton with the Dayliner, a sightseeing boat purpose-built to replace her.

In the TV news spot below, the interviewer speaks to several crew, including Captain Edward Grady and Chief Engineer Elvoid Post, who retired with the boat.

 The following day, the New York Times wrote an article about the Hamilton and her retirement:

BEAR MOUNTAIN, N. Y. Sept. 6—The Alexander Hamilton, the last of the Hudson River sidewheelers, made her final voyage on the river today.

It was the end of an era that began 164 years ago with a paddlewheeler called the Clermont. The captain of that steamboat was Robert Fulton. The skipper of the Alexander Hamilton today was Edward VI. Grady of East Keansburg, N. J., who has spent 25 years on the water and eight years as master of the Alexander Hamilton.

“There are not many of us left,” Captain Grady said on the last run, gazing out at the rain ‐ spattered river. “Steamboats?” a passenger asked.

“Steamboats and Irishmen,” the captain replied.

Replacement on Way
Built in 1923 and commissioned a year later, the Alexander Hamilton will be replaced next season by a sleek new twin‐screw all‐steel diesel powered vessel to be called, prosaically, the Dayliner.

The Hamilton, or the Alexander as steamboat buffs call her, may end up as a restaurant at the South Street Seaport in Lower Manhattan, but her crew—at least some of them—secretly hope she will find some more work on the water.

“There are another 40 years In her, easy,” said Chief Engineer Elvoid Post of Harrington Park, N. J., who joined the ship as a young oiler in 1931 and has been with her ever since, except for a year in 1939 Spent on the Peter Stuyvesant, now serving as a restaurant in Boston.

Chief Post, 71 years old, retired tonight. There were rumors among the crew that he would set a speed record on the return trip from Poughkeepsie. “I'll open her up,” he said, “but I set my speed record on Sept. 23, 1942. We left Bear Mountain at 5:45 P.M. that day. We tied up and I was at Englewood Hospital in New Jersey at 7:15, where my wife was having a baby.”

Chief Post said that the owner of the line then, who lived in Riverdale, the Bronx, told him the next day that all he saw going down the river was steam.

“He told me not to have any more babies,” the chief said. “We did have one more, but it was off‐season.”

An Emotional Trip
To many of the 2,700 passengers today, it was a routine, enjoyable trip with stops at Bear Mountain and West Point, but to about 100 members of the Steamboat Historical Society, to the crew, to yachtsmen along the river and to hundreds of old‐timers along the shore it was an emotion-laden trip.

The powerful tenor steam whistle on the Hamilton was rarely silent as other vessels saluted the 338.6‐feet‐long old queen of the river.

“They know they will never see her like again,” said Captain Grady, as he hauled on the brass whistle pull.

The Hamilton, built at Sparrows Point, Md., at a cost of $850,000, is the last of the old generation of Day Liners, and she is following into retirement not only the Peter Stuyvesant but also the Robert Fulton, now a workmen's dormitory in Nassau, and the Chauncey Depew, long used as a launch in Bermuda.

The Hamilton's graceful wooden superstructure is of a kind now banned by Federal law but, as Chief Engineer Post observed, “We had a safety record the whole shipping world can admire.”

Miss Mary Doran, a retired Yonkers school teacher, who remembered 50 years of Hudson River history, said she came from Florida for the occasion “I never really liked the Hamilton,” she added, “because it was built in the twenties, when they began to get rid of the old elegance.”

Most of today's passengers—the last man to board the vessel in New York was James Norton of Jamaica, Queens —celebrated the day with Scotch and fried chicken served from huge plastic coolers.

The host at one private party on board was William Olcott, a descendant of the family that owned the Day Line for many years and first operated ships on New York's rivers before the War of 1812. The Alexander Hamilton was christened by his aunt, Mrs. A. V. S. Olcott, in 1924. His family owned the Day Line until 1948, the year the last boats ran all the way to Albany.

“My grandmother did not allow beer on the boats until the line went bankrupt in the thirties,” Mr. Olcott said. “They held church services on board every Sunday and there was no hard liquor until my grandmother died.”

The new ship will have the same passenger capacity, about 4,000, or almost double that the largest trans‐Atlantic liners But little boys on board will no longer be able to go below and gaze in awe at the huge paddle wheel cranks pounding up and down in the engine room as the Alexander Hamilton cut through the river at an average speed of 18 knots. Nor will they be able to peek through the portholes at the paddlewheels themselves.

The people on shore, too—the youngsters but more so their elders—will miss the paddles and the graceful glide of the Hamilton as she swept past on the Hudson.

Like just about all of the Hudson River's sidewheel steamboats, the Alexander Hamilton had a sad end. She moved from pier to pier after her retirement, and ended up beached in Atlantic Highlands, NJ until December of 1976, when she was purchased by developer Fred Lafko, who had her pulled off the sandbar and towed to the Navy pier near Monmouth, NJ, where he hoped to restore her as a floating restaurant and museum. In March of 1977, she was added to the National Register of Historic Places. But it was not to be. On November 8, 1977, a storm blew up and the Hamilton sank at her pier. Although several groups tried valiantly to raise the funds, the Hamilton never floated again.

You can learn more about the Alexander Hamilton and see artifacts from the boat at the Hudson River Maritime Museum's new exhibit, commemorating the 50th anniversary of her final year. If you have memories of the Hamilton, please share them in the comments!

​​If you enjoyed this post and would like to support more history blog content, please make a donation to the Hudson River Maritime Museum or become a member today!​

Editor’s Note: The following text is a verbatim transcription of an article featuring stories by Captain William O. Benson (1911-1986). Beginning in 1971, Benson, a retired tugboat captain, reminisced about his 40 years on the Hudson River in a regular column for the Kingston (NY) Freeman’s Sunday Tempo magazine. Captain Benson's articles were compiled and transcribed by HRMM volunteer Carl Mayer. See more of Captain Benson’s articles here. This article was originally published October 13, 1974.

​Ever since the rumble of summer thunder in the Catskills was attributed by Washington Irving to a form of bowling by his merry little men, the Hudson Valley has had a certain renown for its thunder and lightning storms.  Many a boatman has been a witness to spectacular lightning displays, primarily because his boat has been in the middle of the river and he had, as a result, a particularly good vantage point. 

There have been a number of instances where river boats have even been struck by lightning, although I don’t know of a single instance where a boat has been seriously damaged as a result.  This has probably been due, I suppose, to the fact the boat has been effectively grounded by the water on which it floated. 

When boats have been struck by lightning, almost always the target for the lightning bolt has been the flag poles.  In some instances, a flag pole has been split right down the middle.  In others, a flag pole has been snapped off like a matchstick.  Events, such as I describe, I know have occurred to the Day Liners “Alexander Hamilton," "Hendrick Hudson" and “Albany.”

Since the beginning of steamboating, steamers have always carried flagpoles and generally, a generous display of flags and bunting.  If nothing else, the flags gaily flapping in the breeze helped attract attention to the steamer. 
​
Even at night or in the dreariest weather, one would always find a pennant or a wind sock flying from the forward flag pole, for this would help tell the pilot from which direction the wind was blowing.  

The Day Liners, in particular, always had a lot of flag poles.  The big sidewheelers carried eleven flag poles — one at the bow from which on a good day would fly the union jack, one in back of the pilot house from which would fly the house flag, one at the stern from which would fly the national ensign, and eight side poles from which would fly smaller American flags. 
​
During their profit making years, a Day Liner would start the season with a complete set of new flags for sunny days, a complete set of older flags for rainy days, and a set of pennants for windy days.  Prior to World War I, the side poles used to fly the flags of foreign countries, allegedly as a tribute to the diverse population of New York City and its reputation as the nation’s “melting pot," not to mention the possibility of perhaps attracting the people of these diverse backgrounds to ride the steamers.

When lightning would strike a steamer’s flag pole, the jack staff - the one at the bow - seemed to be the greatest attraction.  One one occasion in the 1930's, the “Alexander Hamilton” was in the lower river when she ran into a severe thunderstorm.  The passengers scurried for cover.  Shortly thereafter a bolt of lightning struck the jack staff, snapping it off.  The pilot later related a ball of fire appeared to roll down the edge of the deck from the broken jack staff to about opposite the pilot house and then roll overboard, with no visible damage other than the broken bow flag pole.

​The "Hendrick Hudson” had a similar experience but without the accompanying fire-ball.  The lightning bolt that struck the "Albany” did so in August 1926 while she lay along the Day Line pier at the foot of 42nd Street, New York during a heavy thunder shower.  The lightning in this case struck the stern flag pole and split it down the middle so it lay open like a large palm.  In both cases there was no other damage whatever.

​Perhaps the most spectacular damage from a thunderstorm to a river steamer occurred on June 20, 1899 to the well-known “Mary Powell.”  Here, however, the damage was caused by tornado like winds accompanying the storm and not by lightning.  Captain A. E. Anderson at the time said it was the worst storm he had encountered in his then 25 years of steamboating.

The “Powell” was on her regular up trip from New York to Rondout.  Going through Haverstraw Bay, there appeared to be two thunderstorms, one to the southwest and one to the north, both accompanied by generous displays of lightning.  Near Stony Point the two storms appeared to meet with the “Mary Powell” right at the center.  A cyclonic funnel of dust laden wind seemed to move out from the west shore straight toward the graceful steamboat. 

The wind caught the "Mary Powell” with great force and listed her sharply to starboard. 

The starboard smoke stack came crashing down toward the bow onto the paddle box, the stack’s guys snapped and the supporting rods twisted.  A very short time later, the port smoke stack also toppled over athwart in this instance the aptly named hurricane deck.  The resulting shower of sparks was doused by a deluge of rain that accompanied the storm. 

In about 15 minutes the storm abated and it was all over.  In addition to the toppled smoke stacks, a sliding door had been blown in, the life boats had been lifted from their chocks and the davits bent, and quite a number of folding chairs had been blown overboard. 

The “Powell's” engineers started her blowers and the steamer continued on her way, making her regular landings at Cranston’s (later Highland Falls), West Point, Cornwall, Newburgh, New Hamburg, Milton, Poughkeepsie, Hyde Park and Rondout.  At the time of the great storm, the "Mary Powell” had aboard approximately 200 passengers.  Fortunately, none were injured although many were probably shaken by their experience. 
​
The “Mary Powell” must have presented a strange appearance as she steamed into Rondout Creek with her fallen smoke stacks.  Repair crews had been alerted and as soon as she docked, the workmen commenced work.  A gang of men worked throughout the night and it is said the steamer left Kingston the following morning for New York on her regular schedule.

2021 marks the 50th anniversary of the last trip of the Hudson River Dayline steamboat Alexander Hamilton. The last of the sidewheel steamboats on the Hudson and built in 1924, the Hamilton looms large in the memories of many Hudson River residents. 

On Saturday we took a look at the Hamilton and a surviving life ring. Today, we get to enjoy a short video of the Hamilton's last voyage.

In this newscast from 1971, a reporter interviews Hamilton employees and passengers on her last-ever trip. One employee optimistically states that "Next year we'll have a new ship." Although he may have gone on to work on other passenger boats in New York Harbor or the Hudson River, no sidewheel steamer was ever again built for use on the Hudson River.

If you would like to learn more about the Alexander Hamilton, please visit the Hudson River Maritime Museum and view our new mini-exhibit on the 50th anniversary of her last trip. 

Many thanks to the Steamship Historical Society of America for digitizing this fascinating piece of Hudson River history.

2021 is the 50th anniversary of the last trip of the sidewheel steamboat Alexander Hamilton, so we thought we'd highlight one of the artifacts currently on display in the museum's new mini-exhibit about the Hamilton and her last voyage.

This life ring from the Alexander Hamilton was donated to the museum in 1986 by Charles Metzger, just 15 years after the Hamilton​'s last trip. 

Built in 1924 and taken out of service at the end of 1971, the Alexander Hamilton was built for the Hudson River Day Line and is considered "the last of the Dayliners," and was the last Hudson River sidewheel steamboat constructed. Over 300 feet long, she was not the largest of the Hudson River steamboats, but her construction toward the end of the steamboat heyday on the Hudson River makes her unique. Accommodating over 3,000 passengers, she ran from Albany to New York City until the last few years of her service, when the route was shortened to Poughkeepsie to New York City.

Life rings like this one were used as emergency life preservers for situations when passengers or crew fell overboard or when anyone ended up in the water and needed rescuing. They were designed to be thrown out to a person in the water, and had a line attached so that rescuers could pull the overboard person back to the boat for recovery. Historic life rings were often made of cork, but after WWI they were also made of balsa wood. These lightweight substances would float, allowing the overboard victim to keep their head above water until rescue. The ring design was first posited by Leonardo DaVinci, and was easy to place around one's middle, which is why the rings are sometimes called lifebelts or lifebuoys, among many other names. 

Life rings still remain in use today at marinas and on board vessels where passengers and crew do not regularly use personal floatation devices due to the size of the vessel. The overall basic design remains unchanged - a circle or u-shape floatation device with a line attached to shore or the vessel. Some modern life rings include water-activated lights and GPS tracking, especially those used on ocean-going vessels.

This life ring from the Alexander Hamilton is one of several historic life rings from Hudson River steamboats in the museum's collection. If you would like to visit this artifact in person, it is currently on display in the museum's East Gallery.​

​If you enjoyed this post and would like to support more history blog content, please make a donation to the Hudson River Maritime Museum or become a member today!​

In 2004 the Steamship Historical Society of America produced the documentary film, "Steamboats: On the Hudson." Featuring footage from rarely seen private collections and from public archives, including scenes of the famous Robert Fulton, the last Hudson steamboat powered by a walking-beam engine. Historian Roger Mabie of Port Ewen contributes his first-hand knowledge of Hudson River steamboat history, and noted steam expert Conrad Milster offers perspective on the machinery that drove the era. The film also features Hudson River Maritime Museum Curator Emerita, Allynne Lange. 

In April, 2020, the Steamship Historical Society of America shared this documentary film on their YouTube channel, which allows us to share it with you!

For over 150 years steamboats ruled the Hudson River, carrying passengers and freight between Albany and New York, and the many river communities in between. This program looks back at the golden age of steam, when spit and polish, and elegant surroundings marked a style of travel that has now disappeared.

The Hudson is where steam navigation began, and it is where the American river steamer reached its ultimate expression, with enormous paddle-wheeled vessels carrying over 5,000 passengers. 

Featuring still photographs, historic film footage, and interviews, "Steamboats: On the Hudson" documents the evolution of steam vessels on the Hudson, from the early 1800s up to the final trip of the steamer Alexander Hamilton​ in 1971. 

​We hope you enjoy this engaging and informative documentary film. 

​If you enjoyed this post and would like to support more history blog content, please make a donation to the Hudson River Maritime Museum or become a member today!​

Editor’s Note: The following text is a verbatim transcription of an article featuring stories by Captain William O. Benson (1911-1986). Beginning in 1971, Benson, a retired tugboat captain, reminisced about his 40 years on the Hudson River in a regular column for the Kingston (NY) Freeman’s Sunday Tempo magazine. Captain Benson's articles were compiled and transcribed by HRMM volunteer Carl Mayer. See more of Captain Benson’s articles here. This article was originally published in Tempo on June 25, 1972.

During the early 1920's, when I was a boy growing up in Sleightsburgh, church services used to be held every Sunday afternoon at the little Sleightsburgh chapel on First Street.
​
The Rev. Mr. Anthony of Rondout would conduct the service and be assisted by Mr. Arthur S. Flemming, who later became the president of Ohio Wesleyan University and Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare in President Dwight Eisenhower’s cabinet.  Mr. Flemming at that time had graduated from Kingston High School, but he had graduated so young that his father, Judge Harry Flemming, thought he should wait a year before going on to college.  During that period, he used to assist Rev. Anthony almost every Sunday, being very active in church work.  

On a quiet Sunday afternoon, the bell in the belfry of the chapel would toll shortly before the service was to begin at 3 p.m.  My mother would take my sisters and me with her to the service. ​

Three Long Blasts
At 3:25 p.m., the steamer “Poughkeepsie” of the Central Hudson Line would blow three long blasts on her whistle, announcing her impending departure at 3:30 p.m. from Rondout for New York.  Almost always, Rev. Anthony would be giving his sermon at that time.  When the "Poughkeepsie" would blow her whistle, Rev. Anthony's sermon would come to a dead stop. 

How that whistle would echo through the hills surrounding the Creek!  Especially on one of these hot, lazy summer Sunday afternoons when the windows would be open.  The "Poughkeepsie” would blow … and I'm afraid I would lose all interest in the sermon.  At that time, how I wished I were the lookout on the “Poughkeepsie” and could be aboard her as she started out the creek. 

It is my understanding that much the same thing used to take place at Malden during the late 1930's and 1940's.  At that time, Ellsworth Sniffen of Malden was a pilot on the “Alexander Hamilton’’ of the Hudson River Day Line.  As was the custom on steamboats, most captains and pilots would blow a three blast salute on the whistle to their families as their steamer passed their home ... a steamboatman’s way of saying “hello.”

During the 1930's and ‘40’s, the “Alexander Hamilton” almost always was the up boat to Albany on Saturdays.  This, of course, would mean she would be the down boat on Sunday.  The schedule at that time called for the down boat to leave Catskill at 11:40 a.m. and Kingston Point at 1 p.m.  This would put her past Malden at about 12:15 noon. 

A Momentary Halt.
As the “Hamilton” would come down along the west shore of the River off Malden, Pilot Sniffen would blow the customary three blast salute on the whistle.  Services would be in progress in the church of the hill.  As the “Alexander Hamilton" blew lustily, there would be a momentary halt while the pleasant whistle echoed through the valley. 

Now the steamboat whistles are all gone.  So are many of the churches, such as the little chapel at Sleightsburgh. 

Progress is wonderful, but in its fast-paced course forward so many things of yesteryear are lost in the wake — like the sound of a steamboat whistle on a summer Sunday afternoon.

 
If you enjoyed this post and would like to support more history blog content, please make a donation to the Hudson River Maritime Museum or become a member today!