We had a restful night on the wall in Seneca Falls and woke up with much anticipation for a day on the Erie Canal. We had heavy fog as we made our way across Lake Van Cleef and lined up our approach to the locks 2 and 3 of the Cayuga and Seneca Canal. The combined locks drop boats a total of 49 feet. The lock chambers were turbulent and I had an awful time with our transmission trying unsuccessfully to keep the boat in position. Everyone kept yelling at me to keep the boat in neutral including the lock tender. Neutral, however, was only a state of mind.

When the big steel doors opened at the bottom of Lock 2, an eddy on the swollen and swift flowing Seneca River got a hold of the Belle and we needed full throttle to regain steering and control. Fortunately, full throttle worked just fine. We barreled down the Seneca River with the flood waters for three miles and then briefly entered the north end of Cayuga Lake before finding the approach to Lock 1 at the lake’s outlet. A south turn would have taken us up the lake 40 miles to Ithaca.

We entered Lock 1 with a New York State Canals buoy tender. The lock operator was especially friendly and good natured and maintained manicured lawns and plantings around the lock. Shauna came up on deck to help with the stern line and I stayed put at the pedestal trying to maintain our position with the shift lever. When the lock opened, we travelled north on the Seneca River alongside the Montezuma Wildlife Refuge.

​The river was high and we noticed some flooding and several sunken docks. We passed beneath the New York State Thruway to a roundabout of waterways including the mouth of the Clyde River, a short channel leading to the west-bound Erie Canal, and a short channel carrying the Seneca River and east-bound Erie Canal. We turned right to take a look at the ruins of the 900-foot long Richmond Aqueduct completed on the enlarged Erie Canal in 1857. All but seven of the aqueduct’s 31 stone arches were dynamited in 1917 when the Barge Canal was completed and traffic was routed from the aqueduct to the river. This was one of the longest of the aqueducts on the Erie Canal and remains one the canal’s most impressive and scenic engineering monuments.

​We turned around and headed west on the Erie reaching Lock E-25 at May’s Point in a few minutes. May’s Point was a small tongue of dry land in the great Montezuma Swamp and an important landmark in the trackless swampland here for early travelers going west by boat and the workers forcing the original Erie Canal through the malarial swamps. Lock 25 features a steel arch gateway and remains an oasis surrounded by trees and lawns. After locking up, we traveled west along the artificially dug Barge Canal while observing the many channels and oxbows of the parallel Clyde River immediately to our south. We caught glimpses of the original but abandoned Erie Canal channel immediately to our north.  We went through Lock E-26 just before arriving at the village of Clyde.     

Clyde was settled in 1811 and named Lauraville in anticipation of our best friend Lora’s arrival aboard the Belle (just kidding of course!). A few years later, it was renamed Clyde by Scotsman Andrew McNab who also named the main business street Glasgow Street. The Erie Canal was built right through the settlement which became a bustling glass manufacturing center. When the Barge Canal was built in the early twentieth century, the old canal in town was abandoned and a new and larger channel was established a short distance to the south by straightening and dredging the Clyde River. There was a famous covered bridge over the river on Glasgow Street in the nineteenth century. We believe we observed one of its stone abutments as we continued our journey west.
 
We continued along a heavily wooded stretch of canal interrupted by occasional and somewhat picturesque abandoned railroad bridge abutments festooned with grapevines and poison ivy. For about five miles, the canal parallels the old river with its tortured turns and loops which if traveled by boat would total ten or more miles. Shauna and Lora made soup and nachos for lunch. Soon, the village of Lyons came into view.
 
Lyons was settled in 1789 at the fork of the head of the Clyde River where it was fed by the Canandaigua Outlet and the Ganargua or Mud Creek and named (tongue-in-cheek?) for the French city of Lyon at the fork of the Rhine and the Saone. Its French namesake seemed to have inspired architectural pretensions and the village subsequently developed a skyline with a domed courthouse, two substantial Gothic church towers with tall finials, and a three-story commercial block with a very fine wrought iron gallery at the corner. According to Rochester journalist Arch Merrill, 40 slaves were brought here from Maryland in 1797 to build a 1600 acre plantation for Daniel Dorsey complete with mansion and slave cabins.

​Lyons was established as the seat of Wayne County and its swampy lands became ideal for the culture of essential oils, particularly peppermint. Later in the nineteenth century, it became an important railroad town.  The New York Central Railroad maintained car shops in Lyons until 1923.    

​We passed beneath the Geneva Street bridge and tied up on the wall near the approach to Lock E-27. The lock tender had already opened his gates to lock us up, so I called him on the radio to apologize and to let him know we were stopping in Lyons for a few hours.
 
After connecting to shore power, we took a walk to the east side of town to visit the Trail of Hope. Aptly named, the serpentine trail and surrounding park were recently built by volunteers to offer children and the handicapped an opportunity to experience nature and to plant. We then walked into the town center where we visited the shops on William Street, got fresh coffee and searched unsuccessfully for some peppermint souvenirs. The Hotchkiss Essential Oils Company bottled peppermint oil here until about 20 years ago, shipping the concentrate in cobalt blue bottles and vials to candy and toothpaste manufacturers all over the world. One of their biggest customers was the Life Savers factory in Port Chester, NY, still decorated with larger-than-life peppermint Life Savers. The nineteenth century canal-side building has been preserved.  

We also went over to the courthouse square. One of the most sensational trials conducted in the Wayne County Courthouse was that of Oliver Curtis Perry who hijacked and robbed an express train in 1892 and made an escape by taking an idle locomotive away from the scene.  He was chased, jumped off, stole a horse and sleigh, and then ran on foot. He was sentenced to 49 years, and later escaped from two prisons. The Utica Globe entitled its story of the trial “Startling Career, Desperate Deeds, Gifted Ruffian.”
 
We returned to the Belle, and called the lock operator. He was at Lock E-28A and had to drive to E-27 to pass us west. After locking through, he drove back to E-28A to assist us there. Many lock operators manage two or more locks, shuttling between them by car or when close together by bicycle. Lock E-28A is located at the historic Lyons dry docks where canal tugs and barges are placed on blocks and repaired. Historic Dipper Dredge 3 sits in retirement here, a major artifact from the age of steam and the construction of the Barge Canal in the early twentieth century. The old “Poorhouse Lock” (old lock 56) from the 1840s is preserved here along with a brick canal store which is now a private residence.

​We could have spent at least an hour here, but the day was getting late and we were anxious to cover the few remaining miles to Newark. Several long freight trains ran parallel to the canal here and I was able to signal one in time for the engineer to blow the horn. We locked up through E-28B at the east end of Newark and docked on the wall in front of a village park with full boater services including showers and a laundromat. We had dinner at an Italian restaurant on Main Street. Back at the boat, Shauna baked cookies and we played a few rounds of Pictionary before calling it a night.

​Muddy Paddle's Erie Canal adventure will return next Friday! To read other adventures by Muddy Paddle, see: Muddy Paddle: Able Seaman, about Muddy Paddle's adventures on the replica Half Moon, and Muddy Paddle's Excellent Adventure on the Hudson, about his canoe trip down the Hudson River.
 
The History Blog is supported by museum members and readers like you! Donate or join today!

​Last night I paid our bill at the marina and told Captain Terry that I was planning to depart early in the morning by making a tricky three-point turn with the Belle. He didn’t like that plan at all, and later confided to the first mate that the Belle’s captain was “loco.” Brent tried to calm him down but It bothered him enough that when we woke up Tuesday morning, we found that the captain had relocated the big cruiser at our stern giving the Belle a clear exit to the gap in the breakwater. We shoved off under the good captain’s wary eye at 8:15 and shaped our course north along the east shore of the lake. We were hoping to get a nice view of Hector Falls, but we were in too close to the shore, and the falls were completely screened by topography and vegetation.

​We had a pleasant cruise down the lake with a gentle breeze at our back. As we reached Lodi Point, Brent fired up the gas grill and prepared barbecue pork chops for lunch. Brent loves to cook! The view from the helm consisted of the American flag at our mast, clouds of smoke rising from the bow, and intermittent appearances of our broadly grinning first mate, Brent. There were no boats out on the lake at all. It occurred to me that if we had mechanical trouble or worse, no help was readily available and that there were few access points given the steep banks rising up from the lake.

​It also occurred to someone on shore that our boat was on fire. A call was apparently made to one of the fine local fire departments. A couple of trucks appeared on the ridge to our east but returned to the station after apparently using binoculars or smelling our pork chops.

​We reached Geneva after lunch and it grew overcast as we re-entered the C&S Canal. Here we encountered kayakers and a replica of the steam launch African Queen.

Brent radioed Lock 4 when we saw the Waterloo water tower. The lock came up abruptly around a sharp bend in the canal. There was a heavy outflowing current bent on carrying us to the adjacent spillway where a rental company canalboat was stuck with emergency lines holding her in place. A breeze from the west didn’t help. We bumped our way into the lock chamber, crooked but safe. We were very grateful to have missed the rendezvous with the other boat and the spillway and even more grateful when the lock doors closed, blocking the breeze. Once again I was unable to keep the engine in neutral. The transmission would creep forward and then backward requiring constant adjustments. I tried using a boat hook to handle the hand line nearest the stern without leaving the pedestal, but once the boat gained any momentum, it was impossible. Brent held tight to his line in the bow, so the stern was always the first to go rogue.
 
Once through the lock, we had a routine return to Seneca Falls and tied the boat up to the wall near the Heritage Area Center. The stranded canal boat was recovered from the edge of the spillway later in the afternoon and towed with her frightened occupants to the wall next to us. The renters were sputtering about the boat, the rental company and their “near death” experience at the spillway. They ended their trip in a rented Escalade after abandoning all of their provisions and all of their pride at our gangway.
 
After cleaning, putting away the new food and making the Belle shipshape, we took ourselves on a walking tour of Seneca Falls. At Seneca Falls, a series of waterfalls and rapids created a barrier for west-bound travelers on the Seneca River. A portage was established in 1787 and mills took advantage of water power early in the 19th century. The Seneca & Cayuga Canal established locks here in 1818 and the connection between the two lakes and the Erie Canal was completed in 1825. Using abundant water power and the ability to ship materials by canal, Seneca Falls became a thriving mill town of four and five story mill buildings, foundries, housing, churches and stores employing thousands of laborers.
 
It was against this background that Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Mary Ann McClintock and others organized the Women’s Rights Convention in 1848 at the Wesleyan Chapel on Fall Street. Central New York and the “burned over district” were primed for reform and advocates for abolition, women’s rights and Native Peoples’ rights had been recruiting in the area, especially among a branch of the local Quaker community.
 
The convention, housed within a plain brick church, attracted both women and men and luminaries including Lucretia Mott and Frederick Douglass. It resulted in the publication of the Declaration of Sentiments, now recognized as a seminal moment in the history of human rights. The chapel building became many things after the Convention including, ironically, its final degradation as a decrepit laundromat. To interpret the building’s history after acquisition, the National Park Service initially deconstructed it to reveal only those materials that were original to it in 1848, leaving large sections of the top and sides open to the elements and accelerated deterioration. In 2010, the building was sensibly enclosed with new material where necessary in order to preserve the original walls and the surviving roof timbers.     

​We toured Fall Street, looked at the stores and restaurants, walked over to Elizabeth Candy Stanton’s house and finally sat to rest at a canal-side pavilion near Trinity Church. Lou, the boat owner’s representative, found us and gave us the unexpected but good news that the that the entire canal system would reopen tomorrow morning at 7:00 AM. We picked up a few supplies and had dinner at a pub on Fall St.  It was dark when we returned to the boat. Lou staggered by for a visit after apparently spending a good part of the day at the American Legion. He stumbled on his way down the companionway steps and crashed flat on his face in the galley, blood trickling from his nose and mouth. We got him cleaned up and made him a cup of coffee before sending him home. We took power showers at the visitor center, checked our lines, and then called it a night. We will be entering the Erie Canal tomorrow!     

​Muddy Paddle's Erie Canal adventure will return next Friday! To read other adventures by Muddy Paddle, see: Muddy Paddle: Able Seaman, about Muddy Paddle's adventures on the replica Half Moon, and Muddy Paddle's Excellent Adventure on the Hudson, about his canoe trip down the Hudson River.
 
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​Nineteenth century photographs of Seneca Lake often echo similar scenes along the Hudson River. The long lake is surrounded by steep hills and its assortment of steamboats and canalboats look pretty familiar. The lake was also studded by large villas reminiscent of those on the Hudson and lakeside resorts. Commerce on the lake included the movement of coal and agricultural produce north to the Erie Canal and passenger steamers and ferries transited and criss-crossed the lake much as they did along the Hudson.
 
I got up earlier than my mates and walked around the harbor at sunrise. There were a number of interesting and classic boats here including the excursion boat Seneca Legacy, the 1934 excursion boat Stroller, John Alden’s 1926 schooner Malabar VII and General Patton’s 1939 schooner When & If. I sketched vignettes of each and walked the shoreline in search of a souvenir. I recovered the neck of a green nineteenth century beer or soda bottle from a heap of dredge spoil as a talisman of Watkins Glen’s commercial past.
 
Brent and I prepared bacon, eggs and toast in the galley and got caught on video doing a happy dance in front of the range. After cleaning up, we prepared picnic lunches, strapped on backpacks, and hiked to Watkins Glen State Park, about a mile south of the village. The park is one of the gems of the New York State park system and receives guests from around the world, many of them on tour buses heading to or from Niagara Falls. We encountered visitors from China, India and the Philippines. The centerpiece of the park is a two-mile gorge with 19 waterfalls and a precarious trail built on ledges, over stone bridges, through tunnels and up an endless series of steps and staircases. The park was established by a journalist in 1863 and acquired by New York State in 1935. A biblical flood in 1935 raised the water 80 feet deep midway through the gorge and within a few feet of a surviving bridge. Most of the stone-lined trail and bridges post-date this appalling flood.

​We reached the top of the gorge and had a pleasant picnic under the shade of a tree. It was 88 F. It was easier descending the gorge than climbing it, but it was a hot afternoon so we stopped for ice cream at the “Colonial” on Main Street. We returned to the boat and relaxed for about an hour.
 
We bought some wine on Main Street for friends and had dinner at an Italian restaurant a few blocks south of the lake. Overhearing the conversations, it was apparent that many of the diners here were connected with auto racing and the Gand Prix in particular.

​After dinner we saw a micro-beer ad at the Chamber of Commerce. Shauna was determined to get some for our son but it was only sold in growlers at the brewery or at a liquor store south of the state park entrance. The brewery was closed so she took one of the bikes lashed to the cabin top and rode into the sunset. She arrived just after the store closed but somehow convinced an employee to let her in to purchase the beer anyway. She returned triumphantly an hour later with a bulging backpack!

​We watched a comedy in the salon and enjoyed popcorn and chocolate. We called it a night at 11:00 PM and slept soundly on a calm and mild night.

​Muddy Paddle's Erie Canal adventure will return next Friday! To read other adventures by Muddy Paddle, see: Muddy Paddle: Able Seaman, about Muddy Paddle's adventures on the replica Half Moon, and Muddy Paddle's Excellent Adventure on the Hudson, about his canoe trip down the Hudson River.
 
The History Blog is supported by museum members and readers like you! Donate or join today!

​The Belle was comfortable for a boat of her size. The wood paneled cabins were warm and attractive, the layout was convenient and there was plenty of headroom. Shelving, cabinets and drawers used space efficiently and the window ports were dressed with curtains. A packet boat of the kind used on these canals before the Civil War would have been nearly twice as long, but would have carried dozens of passengers, segregated by gender and fit into bunks that could be folded away or otherwise removed during the day. Our boat cruises at about five or six miles per hour, only slightly better than its horse drawn predecessors. Mule drawn freight boats were slower.

After an infusion of coffee, we cast off our lines and headed for Lock 4 and Seneca Lake beyond.  Lock 4 is in the village and takes boats up to the lake level. We radioed the lock in advance of our approach and had a green light and open gates when we arrived. I got the boat lined up nicely on the right side of the lock chamber and put the shift into neutral so I could leave the pedestal and take hold of one of the hand lines to keep the boat parallel and next to the chamber wall. Brent did the same in the bow.

​We started having problems as soon as the doors closed behind us. First, the boat would begin to creep forward and Brent would yell that he couldn’t hold his line any more. I would go back to the pedestal, give the boat a few revolutions of reverse, go back to neutral and then run back to grab my line. But then the boat would creep backwards. She was living up to her name the Belle MULE!” I was grateful when the chamber was full and the gates opened at the upper end.
 
We encountered a stiff current carrying excess lake water east over the spillway and had to use the bow thruster to remain on course. Two miles west, we stopped at a dock and walked up to Route 20 to visit the Scythe Tree, a local point of interest with a sad story. James Wyman Johnson enlisted in the Union Army in 1861 and left his scythe in the crotch a cottonwood tree near his family’s farmhouse. He asked that it remain there until his return. He died of battle wounds in a Confederate prison in Raleigh and never returned to the farm. The tree grew around the scythe. When the United States entered World War I, two brothers living on the farm, Ray and Lynn Schaffer, enlisted, placed their scythes in another crotch of the tree and found them embedded in the tree, when unlike Johnson, they returned safely. All three scythes remain in the big tree.
 
We continued our cruise west into Seneca Lake and set a course for Belhurst Castle on the west shore of the lake below Geneva where we had made brunch reservations. However, we realized that it was getting late and a long brunch, not to mention the steep ascent up from the dock, would burn up hours and delay our efforts to reach Watkins Glen and find a berth. It was also beautiful weather, so we cancelled our reservations and continued our cruise, viewing the big Victorian house from half a mile out. We steered well clear of a sailboat race underway at the north end of the 36-mile long lake.

In addition to its considerable length, Seneca Lake is also more than 600 feet deep and littered with the wrecks of dozens of canalboats, steamboats and other craft from its long history of use. Many of these went down in bad weather and as a result of accidents (maybe this is why the boat rental companies prohibit their canalboats from venturing out onto the lakes….). Others were scuttled here at the end of the animal powered canal era. One of the best wrecks for divers to visit is located along our course below Geneva in Glass Factory Bay at a depth of about 115 feet. Unfortunately, visiting divers were careless some years earlier and dragged an anchor through the intact canalboat, carrying its lightly framed cabin top off the boat and over the side.

​Traveling south at about six miles per hour, we reached the power plant near Dresden late in the morning and the Navy training platform in the center of the lake around 1:00 PM. The derrick-studded platform is now leased as a research facility but some years ago it represented the center of a highly classified experimental submarine warfare station and was heavily guarded by armed sentries and patrol boats.  Shauna and Lora relaxed and soaked up the sun in lawn chairs set up in the bow. Women passengers aboard the packet boats were similarly offered chairs in the bow to enjoy their journeys.
 
Watkins Glen is located at the south end of Seneca Lake and we began making calls and using the radio in an effort to find a berth for the Belle. The most likely facility was Village Marina but we were unable to make contact. After passing several very large cruising sloops and a schooner we arrived at a rip rap breakwater protecting the marina. The radio crackled and we were told to switch to channel 66.  Once there, Captain Terry, the marina manager, told us that he had a berth available. He sounded agitated.  He told us to enter the basin between two drunken pilings; turn sharply right and then approach the T-dock “under spirits.” As we entered, we could see that there was very little space to maneuver and that there were plenty of big and expensive fiberglass cruisers to stay clear of. I threw the transmission into reverse to kill our momentum, spun the wheel to starboard and then crawled forward. A crowd emerged outside of the bar to watch the expected pile-up. We could see that we would need to parallel park because there was no room to turn the Belle around. A gentle breeze helped us line up and a bystander threw us a line at exactly the right moment.  We made a clean landing, secured our lines and shut down the engine. A greeting committee gathered with drinks for us and we felt obliged to graciously open up the boat to them to satisfy their curiosity. One woman on her fourth martini made herself at home in the salon where she held court.
 
Captain Terry raced in from the lake to see if we had done any damage to the expensive boats or the docks. Seeing that we were well secured and seemingly accepted at the marina, he relaxed a little and explained that hire boats like ours make him nervous. A similar boat crashed and sank on the inside of the stone breakwater in a previous year. Recalling the incident, he said, “you know a guy is in trouble when you see his wife yelling at him, his daughter tugging on him and his mother-in-law giving him instructions as he tries to dock a big boat.”

​After tidying up and gently asking Mrs. Martini to leave, we walked into Watkins Glen, explored Main St, and got bad directions to Walmart where we planned to buy groceries and ice. We returned to boat much more directly using a shortcut along the railroad tracks. Brent found that our grille had no gas, so he made a second trip to Walmart to get some so that he could grill chicken for dinner on the bow. Shauna and Lora prepared salads and rice in the galley. We set up folding chairs on the cabin top and had a relaxing dinner as the sun set. Sailing cruisers and an excursion boat sailed in and out of of the harbor with red and green running lights as it got darker. We retired to the cabin for a spirited game of Pictionary and fell asleep quickly as the sea gulls squealed overhead. We slept restfully as the Belle swayed gently to the lake swells.   

​Muddy Paddle's Erie Canal adventure will return next Friday! To read other adventures by Muddy Paddle, see: Muddy Paddle: Able Seaman, about Muddy Paddle's adventures on the replica Half Moon, and Muddy Paddle's Excellent Adventure on the Hudson, about his canoe trip down the Hudson River.
 
The History Blog is supported by museum members and readers like you! Donate or join today!

There are several excellent canalboat rental outfits but Muddy selected a well-worn narrow boat from a private owner for this trip. He and his crew members picked up the boat on the Cayuga and Seneca Canal in Seneca Falls and planned to travel north to the junction with the Erie at May’s Point and then west on the Erie to Buffalo. The all steel Belle Mule was a retired hire boat measuring 46 feet in length, 12 feet in beam and a draft of about 3.5 feet. She featured a virtually flat bottom with a rounded bow and stern.  Her cabin was built of steel and contained a galley and salon at the after end and two compartments forward, each with a head, and bunks for four. She had been designed to recall the shape of a nineteenth century horse-drawn packet boat. The Belle was powered by a Yanmar diesel beneath the quarterdeck and a bow thruster for help in docking in tight quarters. She carried a pedestal helm with a steering wheel and engine controls. The quarterdeck was protected from rain and sun by a canvas canopy. A marine radio was carried under the canopy with the microphone hanging directly above the helm.

The weather was terrible for the the entire week before Muddy’s departure and rainwater flooded the Erie throughout central New York. The Finger Lakes were over their banks flooding Penn Yan and discharging millions of gallons of water into the Seneca River and other feeders of the canal including the Clyde River. An advisory was issued temporarily closing the Erie but allowing the Cayuga and Seneca to remain open. So Muddy changed the itinerary to explore the Finger Lakes in hopes that the Erie would re-open later in the week, which it did. His illustrated account of the adventure, taken from his on-board journal, is presented in the following pages.

We sailed to Seneca Falls aboard Brent’s Silverado. The bed of the truck was filled will gear and provisions and the hatch was covered with a tarp due to the never-ending rain. The weather improved as we plotted our final approach to the village.  Arriving at the Water St bulkhead, we met the boat owner’s representative, Lou. Lou turned over the keys and we took the boat out for a brief shakedown cruise on Lake Van Cleef to get acquainted with her operation and handling. 
 
Lake Van Cleef is a product of the early twentieth century Barge Canal. The falls on the Seneca River, and the stone locks carrying boats around the falls were dammed and flooded in 1915 to create two massive concrete locks with a combined 42-foot drop and an adjacent hydroelectric plant. Many of the water-powered factories in Seneca Falls were demolished in preparation for the flooding and the character of the village was forever changed. The old Cayuga and Seneca Canal locks and building foundations remain intact at the bottom of the lake. We had a nice ten-minute cruise before returning to the wall, moving our gear aboard and then berthing the truck at a village lot.

After getting the boat settled, we motored under the George Bailey bridge (Seneca Falls is said to have been the inspiration for Bedford Falls in the Jimmy Stewart film “It’s a Wonderful Life”) and continued several miles west on the C&S Canal to Waterloo to take in Memorial Day weekend celebrations.

Founded on the site of a Cayuga village destroyed during the American Revolution, Waterloo was settled in the 1790s, named “New Hudson” in 1807 and then re-named “Waterloo” in 1816 in commemoration of Napoleon’s 1815 defeat. The village retains fine early nineteenth century houses and later nineteenth century commercial blocks.

Waterloo bills itself as the birthplace of Memorial Day, first celebrated here in 1866.  At Lafayette Park, we found an enormous display of flags, food vendors, and bands playing country, swing and rock. A tribute rock band belted out Judas Priest and AC/DC and a country band performed “Sentimental Journey.”

​We visited a Civil War re-enactment camp and listened to the Erie Canal song accompanied by guitar. The “Erie Canal” song was tamed and published by Thomas Allen as “Low Bridge, Everybody Down” in 1905, but earlier versions referenced the darker side of life along the canal. One of the many folk stanzas still circulating at the time the song got cleaned up referred to Sal as an alcoholic cook who “died in sin, and had too much gin; ain’t no bar where she didn’t go, from Albany to Buffalo.” 
 
We had a food truck dinner at the park and returned to the Belle for the evening where we watched fireworks above the village from the cabin top. Lou stopped by before we turned-in for the evening and asked us if we wanted to go out for a few beers. Brent lied and said that he was an 67 and  “too old for that kind of nonsense.”

Muddy Paddle's Erie Canal adventure will return next Friday! To read other adventures by Muddy Paddle, see: Muddy Paddle: Able Seaman, about Muddy Paddle's adventures on the replica Half Moon, and Muddy Paddle's Excellent Adventure on the Hudson, about his canoe trip down the Hudson River.

The History Blog is supported by museum members and readers like you! Donate or join today!

Although you may never have heard of him, Buster the brindle bulldog was once one of the most famous dogs on the Hudson River. The pet of Capt. and Mrs. A. Eltinge Anderson, Buster accompanied his master at his work aboard the steamboat Mary Powell. Much beloved by both passengers and crew, Buster was so good at a number of tricks, he ended up in the newspaper

On August 23, 1903, the New York Times, published a biographical account of Buster and his exploits. The Kingston Daily Freeman, eager to pay tribute to the local hero, published the same account a few days later on August 25th: 

Of all the mascots which are supposed to bring good luck to the ships and boats which ply in the harbor of New York there is none more accomplished than “Buster,” the mascot of the Mary Powell, the Albany Day Line boat which runs between New York and Kingston on the Hudson. “Buster” is a dog owned by Capt. Anderson and is held in affectionate regard not only by all the members of the crew of the Mary Powell, but by all of the residents of Hudson River towns who are frequent passengers on that steamer.

“Buster” is six years of age, having first seen the light of day on March 4, 1897, the date of President McKinley’s first inauguration. His tutors have been Capt. Anderson and the members of the Mary Powell’s crew, and he has progressed so well under their instruction that Capt. Anderson now declares him to be the best swimmer and sailor connected with the boat.

“Buster” takes to water like a duck. An invitation from his master to disport himself in the Hudson River fills him with delight. With one leap he is over the railing of the boat and he can frolic around in the water for an hour without getting tired. As it is impossible for him to make a landing once he is in the water owing to the docks and the sea wall around the Albany Day Line’s wharf, he is brought back into the boat by a peculiar and ludicrous manner. Capt. Anderson sends one of the members of the crew out onto a float and the sailor lures “Buster” to the float by throwing him a stick. “Buster” goes after the stick and brings it back to the float in his mouth. The sailor then catches hold of the stick and hauls “Buster” up onto the float, the dog retaining a firm grip on the piece of wood. Once “Buster” is on the float, another sailor throws out a line to the man on the float. This is fastened around “Buster’s” body. The dog is then told to take another dive. When is he again in the water, the sailor on the boat pulls him in just as he would a fish.

On Thursday, March 12, 1908, at the ripe old age of 11, Buster passed away. On that date, the Kingston Daily Freeman reported "BUSTER IS DEAD. Mrs. A. E. Anderson's dog, Buster, the best known dog along the Hudson, died this morning of old age."

The following day, on Friday, March 13, 1908, they reprinted the above biography, but with an addendum on the end:

Since the above was first published "Buster" had added to his accomplishments.  He was the owner of a pass on the local trolley line, and often used the privilege when alone, boarding and leaving the cars the same as any other passenger.

Perhaps Buster took a trolley like the one above! 
​
​The staff and volunteers of the Hudson River Maritime Museum had a delightful time researching Buster and his history. We hope you enjoyed this story as much as we did. 

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 working in the archives today with volunteer G.M. Mastropaolo, we discovered this delightful timetable in the Donald C. Ringwald collection. Outlining travel times and locations for steamboats, steam yachts, ferries, stages/stagecoaches, and railroads in Rondout, Kingston, "and vicinity." 

Among the many time tables is that of the ferry boat Transport. To learn more about the Transport, ​check out our past blog post about its history and use. 

Of particular interest to the collections staff and volunteers at the museum was this time table for the steamboat Mary Powell, the star of our 2020 exhibit, "Mary Powell: Queen of the Hudson," opening April 25, 2020. 

"Handy Book of the Catskill Mountains" was designed for those traveling to the Kingston area for access to the Catskill Mountains and mountain houses. Measuring just 4 by 2.5 inches, this tiny little handbook would fit perfectly in a pocket or lady's reticule. 

The Hudson River Maritime Museum is pleased to make this handbook available to the public. If you would like to view the entire book, chock full of both traveler's information and period advertisements, click the button below to download a PDF. 

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

March, 2020 is March Membership Madness here at the museum. If you join in the month of March, you can receive 20% off (for 2020) any membership level. Learn more.