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STEAM VESSELS

N. J., but was prevented by Livingston & Fulton. The matter was at length compromised so that Ogden ran his boat. He had a partner in his ferry property named Thomas Gibbons of Savannah, Ga., who opened an opposition line to Ogden, and it was on this route and line Cornelius Vanderbilt began his steamboat career. This opposition, commenced in 1818, was the cause of the lawsuit that was carried to the United States Supreme Court, where in 1824 a decree was entered against Ogden, thus breaking down the steamboat monopoly. The steam ferry-boat was first brought into use by Robert Fulton, on the Fulton ferry running from New York to Brooklyn in May 1814.

Hudson River Boats.- After the waters of the United States were thrown open to the free navigation of steamboats in 1824, the number of steam vessels increased on the Hudson River, as that was the most expeditious mode of travel from New York to Albany, as well as the best patronized channel of travel from the seaboard to the Western States, that were just then being opened to the settler. The new vessels were great improvements over the vessels of the North River Company, that now in many instances became tow-boats. For nearly 10 years later several lines were formed that were well backed financially for that period, until in 1832, when they were all consolidated. In 1835 the People's Line was opened with the Westchester and the Emerald. The most noted of the boats of this period were the Swallow and the Rochester, that were rivals on the New York and Albany route, and for several years were very often engaged in racing. This was the opening stage of that fierce rivalry between the lines on the river that was so well known for many years, when at times, so intense has been the competition, passengers have been transported the entire length of the navigable river free of cost of carriage. This lasted until 1852, when the steamboat law went into efect, which brought the operation of our steamboats under the United States law. And it was well it did even at that late date. The completion of the Hudson River Railroad in the latter part of 1851 had a great effect in diminishing the number of steamboats on the river. Since then the business on the river has been in the hands of companies that have been strong financially, and who have catered to the public travel with the better class of vessels suited to the service. The present day line was started in 1863 with the City of Albany, and was incorporated in 1879. The present boats of the line, the New York and the Albany, are the finest and the most speedy steamboats that have ever been on the river. The People's Line of night boats, or New Jersey Steamboat Company, had built in 1896 the Adirondack, that was a marked advance upon the form of the previous vessels of the line. Their first steel hull vessel, the C. W. Morse, is now nearing completion, and both these vessels are certainly a credit to the line. There have been at different periods several fine boats on the river to the lower landings, and possessed of high speed, that may be mentioned, such as the Mary Powell, the Thomas Powell, and the Alida.

Long Island Sound.- Communication by water on Long Island Sound dates back to VOL. 19 - 33

1813-14 when the Fulton was constructed for service from New York to New Haven, but on account of the War of 1812 and the activity of the British naval vessels off our coast at the time, it was deemed prudent to postpone the opening of the new line. It was not until 21 March 1815 that the vessel was placed on the route. In 1818 the Connecticut was brought out in the same interest, and run from New York to New Haven, while the Fulton was run from New Haven to Norwich, Conn., as it was considered unwise to run a boat on such a long route as from New York to Norwich, Conn., at that time. These vessels thus ran until prevented by the passage of the retaliatory law by Connecticut in 1822, when they ran to Providence, R. I. The United States was purchased in 1822 by New Haven parties and ran to Byram Cave, N. Y., and this service continued until the exclusive privilege of Fulton and others was declared unconstitutional, when the vessel was run direct from New York to New Haven. This was the beginning of the New Haven Steamboat Company. Other vessels followed of improved construction, and larger and better accommodations. They had their periods of opposition and low fares as on other important routes. The finest vessel that

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has thus far been on the line has been the Richard Peck, that has proved to be a vessel of high speed, and is well patronized by the traveling public. In 1899 a duplicate of this vessel, the Chester W. Chapin, was added to the line. Providence, R. I., was first served with a steamboat line in 1822. In the following six years three new steamboats were built for the line to New York, and during this period opposition began on the route. This had now become the most popular route from New York to the Eastern States. In 1835 Cornelius Vanderbilt placed the Lexington, then a new boat, on the route, and being one that developed in a short time higher speed than those on the old line, drew a greater portion of the passenger travel. The Boston and New York Transportation Company had the Boston, the Providence, and the Massachusetts in 1836. The Lexington was again on the route in 1836,

STEAM VESSELS

and having made it lively for the old company, they had the Narragansett built, to be on even terms with the opposition, as they thought; but they were mistaken. The Lexington was purchased by the Transportation Company in 1838, as another opposition line with the J. W. Richmond had presented itself for public favor. The Lexington took fire while on a trip from New York to Stonington on 13 Jan. 1840 when off Eaton's Neck, Long Island. There were at least 150 persons on board, and all were lost except four. After 1845 the passenger service to Providence fell off to a great extent, and it was many years before it was resumed with a first-class passenger line. Stonington had become the popular route. The New Jersey Steam Navigation Company controlled the business of this route from 1840 to 1867, when they withdrew their boats from the service. A first-class passenger line was not resumed to Providence until 1877, when the Rhode Island and the Massachusetts were placed on the route by the Stonington Steamship Company, and then began the war of rates that lasted so long on Long Island Sound. These boats were followed by the Connecticut, and later by the Plymouth and others. The Joy line commenced running to Providence in 1899. After the Stonington line was closed up in 1867 there were no steamboats running to Stonington until January 1868, when the Stonington Railroad Company and others organized the Stonington Steamship Company, and ran the Narragansett and the Stonington. These vessels were succeeded by the Rhode Island (No. 3) and later by the two propellers Maine and the New Hampshire. The Fall River Line was opened in 1847 with the Bay State, and the next year the Empire State was added, and a few years later the Metropolis. The company was reorganized in 1863 and a new fleet of boats built for the line that did service until the consolidation with the Narragansett Steamship Company in 1874. Their first iron hull vessel, the Pilgrim, was added in 1883, and subsequently the floating palaces, the Puritan, the Plymouth, and the Priscilla were placed on the line. To New London and Norwich, Conn., there were several lines run up to 1860, when the Norwich & New York Transportation Company was organized, and the City of Boston and the City of New York were built. A few years later three smaller passenger and freight boats were built. In 1881 their first iron hull steamboat, City of Worcester, was placed in service, and in 1894 the steel hull twin-screw propeller City of Lowell was added to the line. This vessel has proved to be one of high speed.

Lake Steamers.- Steam navigation on the Great Lakes dates from the year 1818 when the Walk-in-the-Water was built to run on Lake Erie. The most radical departure in steamboat design and construction on the Lakes was in the building of the Great Western in 1838, by the adding of the upper cabin with staterooms, and converting the lower cabins into steerage quarters and freight compartments. There were several fine and large side wheel passenger boats built after 1845, after the general style of the Long Island Sound boats, up to 1856. The extension of the railroads along the shore of Lake Erie soon made their business unprofitable. Since 1880 there have been several large iron

or steel hull passenger boats built to run from Buffalo and Cleveland to Detroit, and fitted with large engine power, that have proved themselves to be vessels of very high speed. Lake Ontario had its first steam vessel in the Lake Ontario built in 1816. There were several lines of beam-engine boats on the lake up to 1860, when the railroads, having absorbed the greater part of the business, several of the vessels were brought to the coast by running the rapids of the St. Lawrence River.

Coast of Maine Steamboats.-The coast of Maine was first visited by a steam vessel in 1823. There were many vessels running from Boston, Mass., to Portland, Maine, and the coast towns up to 1845, when the Sanford line began operations. The Portland Steam Packet Company began their operations in 1843. The iron hull propeller Bangor, running from Boston to Bangor, Maine, began its service in 1845. The International Steamship Company, running from Boston to Saint John, N. B., began operations in 1859. All the lines running from Boston to the coast of Maine were consolidated in November 1901.

Western River Steamboats.-The first steamboat constructed for the Western rivers was the New Orleans, built at Pittsburg, Pa., in 1811 under the supervision of Nicholas J. Roosevelt for Livingston and Fulton. Several vessels were constructed for these waters dur

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ing the next decade, but of a different form of hull and type of engine, several of them being more like those of a later date. The conditions under which the steamboats on the Western rivers are operated are so different from those on other rivers of the United States, that they are required in design to conform more closely to the surrounding conditions. The shallowness of the channel makes it necessary for the hulls of these vessels to be of great length and width in proportion to the depth of hull. The engines are all poppet valves, worked by levers, with the cylinders set horizontally on wooden frames, generally. The boilers are usually plain cylinder with two flues each. They are worked non-condensing under a pressure of 100 to 125 pounds to the square inch. They are usually fitted with side wheels, but of late years the stern-wheel boat has been favored for some service. There were a few compound engines in boats on the rivers several years ago, which type of engine appears to have been taken up again on the Western rivers very recently. Before the railroads in the Western States became so numerous, the passenger and freight business in that section of the country was largely carried on by the steamboats, and at that time there were many fine and fast steamboats on the Mississippi and the Ohio rivers, and a few of large dimensions. There was in

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1852 the Eclipse of 363 feet long with two engines of 36 inches by II feet stroke each. The J. M. White of 1844 of 250 feet long, with two engines of 30 inches by 10 feet stroke each. Then at a later date the Grand Republic of 1876 of 350 feet long with two engines of compound type. The J. M. White of 1878 was 321 feet long with two engines 43 inches by II feet stroke each, and water wheels 45 feet diameter and 18 feet 6 inches face. The famous race of the Natchez and Robert E. Lee on the Mississippi River began on the afternoon of 30 June 1870 from New Orleans, and ended at Saint Louis on the morning of 4 July. The latter made the 1,218 miles in 3 days 18 hours and 30 minutes. The Natchez had run into a fog and grounded about 300 miles below Saint Louis that delayed her about six hours.

Ocean Steamships.-There have been a few attempts made to dispute the claim of the Savannah as the pioneer steamship of the Atlantic Ocean, but when these attempts have been closely examined it still leaves the American vessel at the head of the list. She was constructed at New York in 1818 by Francis Fickett as a sailing packet originally, but an engine and boiler were fitted before being placed in service. She was owned by parties at Savannah, Ga. On 24 May 1819 she left Savannah for Liverpool, England, which port was reached in 27 days, 80 hours of which time she was operated by steam power. On 29 September she started on her return to the United States, stopping at a few of the Baltic ports, and arrived at Savannah 30 November. Subsequently her machinery was removed and the hull converted to a sailing vessel, and run between New York and Savannah, Ga., until driven ashore on Great South Beach on Long Island, 5 Nov. 1821, during a gale, where she became a total loss. There was a long interval of time before another American steamship crossed the Atlantic Ocean, but during that period much knowledge had been gained of steam navigation that was of use in constructing ocean steamers. The Ocean Steamship Company in 1847 had the Washington and the Herman built for a line from New York to Bremen, they having obtained a contract to carry the United States mail for 10 years. In 1849 the New York and Havre Steam Navigation Company obtained a contract to carry the United States mail to Havre, and during the same year had the Franklin and the Humboldt constructed for the line. The latter vessel having been lost in 1853, and the former in 1854, the company ran the line with chartered vessels until the Arago and the Fulton were built and placed on the line in 1855. This line was well managed and received more American patronage than any other running to the same ports. These vessels ran until the opening of the Civil War in 1861. The next line of American ocean steamships was the Collins line, organized about 1847 as the New York and Liverpool United States Mail Steamship Company. The Atlantic and the Pacific were built in 1849, and the next year the Baltic and the Arctic were constructed for them at New York. The general dimensions of these vessels were each 277 feet long, 45 feet beam, and 24 feet depth of hold. Their motive power was a pair of "side lever" engines, the first two vessels

built having cylinders 95 inches by 9 feet stroke, while the others were larger. The line started under a contract to carry the mail for $385,000 per annum, which was subsequently increased to $858,000: yet with this large mail pay, cr subsidy, just as it is viewed, and a large share of the passenger travel and freight, it failed to be a paying line. The rivalry existing with the Cunard line at this time was very great, and the expenses of operation in making record time voyages made a heavy drain upon the finances of the company. There were also commercial and political interests that were antagonistic to the company, so that by 1857 Congress had cut down the appropriation for mail pay to less than the original amount; and as the line could not be operated successfully under these conditions the last vessel was withdrawn from the route in January 1858. Congress virtually "froze out" the company. The Adriatic was added to the fleet in 1857, and made but one voyage in the line. The remaining vessels afterward passed into other hands. The Arctic was lost by collision off Cape Race on 27 Sept. 1854; and the Pacific sailed from Liverpool on 23 Sept. 1856 and was never heard from afterward. The Atlantic was broken up in September 1871; and the Baltic was broken up about 1880, having for some time been run as a sailing vessel, her machinery having been removed. Cornelius Vanderbilt in 1855 began the operation of a line of steamships to Southampton and Havre with the North Star and the Ariel, and during the next year ran to Bremen. At this time he had built the Vanderbilt, his largest ocean steamship, that ran with some one of his large fleet of ocean steamships, to either Bremen or Havre until the opening of the Civil War. There were a few attempts made after 1865 to build up an American transatlantic line from New York, but they all ended in failures. It was also tried from Boston by the American Steamship Company, who had in 1866-7 the Erie and the Ontario built. The latter vessel made one voyage and returned, when laid up: while the former never made a voyage in the line.

The American Liners. In 1871 the American Line, controlled by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company, was organized to run a line of steamships from Philadelphia, Pa., to Liverpool. It will be noted that this was at the beginning of the period when iron shipbuilding in the United States began to increase, and the compound marine engine was coming into favor. The company had built in 1873-4 the Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. These proved to be good, staunch, and serviceable vessels for the line, though only of average speed under good conditions. They subsequently passed into the hands of the International Navigation Company, which absorbed the Inman line in 1886. The present American line is the result of an Act of Congress of 1892, providing with other conditions that certain foreign built steamships should receive American register on condition that steamships of corresponding tonnage were built in the United States. This led to the City of Paris and the City of New York receiving American register in 1893, and their names being then abbreviated to Paris and New York. Contracts were then made

STEAMBOATS·

with the William Cramp Ship and Engine Building Company for the Saint Paul and the Saint Louis, they having the first quadruple expansion engines built in the United States for the Atlantic service. These vessels ran to Southampton and Cherbourg. They are elegantly fitted and furnished in their passenger accommodations, are well patronized by the American traveling public, and have shown on more than one occasion that they are possessed of more than average high speed. In January 1903 the American and Red Star lines were consolidated with four British lines as the International Mercantile Marine Company.

Coastwise Steamships.-The Robert Fulton, built in 1819, was the pioneer in the coastwise trade with steam vessels, and ran between New York and the island of Cuba from 1820 to 1825, when sold to the Brazilian government. There were no steam vessels running coastwise from the latter date till 1832, when a small steamboat named the David Brown was refitted and run from New York to Charleston, S. C. In the next six years there were five larger vessels built for the same route, but of the same general type of vessel. After the loss of one of these vessels in 1837, public confidence in their safety became so shaken that they no longer found profitable employment on the route, and in a short time were withdrawn. The first steamships to be employed along our coast were those built in 1846-7 to run between New York and Charleston, S. C., the Southerner and the Northerner. These vessels were the pioneers of the many steam vessels that were built in a few years to run on lines between the Atlantic ports. The largest development of our early ocean steam marine began with the discovery of gold in California. During the Civil War these coastwise lines of side wheel steamships were discontinued. Then they were opened again and gradually fell into financially strong hands. Most of them after 1870 began the construction of iron hull vessels with compound propeller engines, and by 1880 had laid aside the wooden hull vessels with the expensive beamengine, or the simple condensing propeller engine, so that at the present time we find a fine fleet of large vessels running from all our principal ports on the coast, that are operated at a much less cost for same size of vessel than those in the same service 30 years or more ago. Whalebacks. These vessels have a main deck rounded over, and resemble the back of a whale. They are for use in rough water, the waves passing completely over them without resistance or injury. The first one was built for a Baltimore company about 1860. Such vessels are now used as grain carriers on the Great Lakes; and more recently as passenger vessels. Their average speed is nearly 20 miles per hour.

Double Screw Ferry-boats.-This type of vessel, having a screw or screws at opposite ends of the vessel, is for ferry service of comparatively recent date, although double-screw steam vessels were built in this country many years ago. These vessels must not be confused with a twin-screw vessel having two screws at the stern of a vessel. The pioneer of the later development was the Bergen, built in 1888 for the Hoboken ferry, having a tripleexpansion engine. Since then this type of ferry

STEARIC ACID

boat has been growing in public favor until at this time it appears to be driving the oldfashioned side-wheeler out of use.

Screw Propellers.-After John Steven's experiments with the screw propeller in 1802 to 1806, there was nothing done in this country to practically demonstrate the value of the screw until the Robert F. Stockton, having an Ericsson propeller, was brought to this country in 1839. Then the propeller began to come into use, both on the Atlantic coast as well as on Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, and it is altogether probable that its largest development_in the first decade was on the northern lakes. See also NAVAL CONSTRUCTION; SHIP-BUILDING.

J. H. MORRISON, Author of 'History of American Steam Navigation.

Steamboats. See STEAM VESSELS.
Stea'rates. See STEARIC ACID, etc.

Stearic Acid, Stearates, and Stearin. Stearic acid is an organic, fatty acid, which occurs (in combination with glycerin) in many of the fixed natural fats, and especially in those which are relatively hard at ordinary temperatures. It has the chemical formula CHO.OH, and is monobasic, the only one of its hydrogen atoms that is replaceable by a base being that in the hydroxyl radical. Stearic acid is insoluble in water, but dissolves in alcohol and in ether, from which it is deposited in the form of brilliant pearly crystalline scales or plates. It melts at 156° F., but cannot be boiled under normal atmospheric pressure without partial decomposition. Under a pressure of 15 millimetres of mercury (about one fifteenth of an atmosphere), it boils at 450° F., and may be distilled without change. Its density, at ordinary temperatures, is practically the same as that of water. It has neither taste nor odor. It burns very much like wax, and is extensively used in the manufacture of fine candles, either alone or when mixed with paraffin, Stearic acid forms salts (known as "stearates") with alkalies, alkaline earths, and metallic oxids; ordinary soap (q.v.) usually containing a greater or lesser proportion of stearate of sodium or of potassium. With glycerin, stearic acid forms three welldefined compounds, which are respectively known as "monostearin," "distearin," and "tristearin." Of these the last is by far the most important, since it occurs in large quantities in many of the natural fats. Tristearin (which is the substance that is understood when "stearin" is mentioned without further qualification) may be prepared by filtering melted suet to remove the fibrous matter that it contains, and subsequently dissolving the tristearin from the filtrate by the aid of hot ether. Upon the evaporation of the ether, tristearin separates in the form of white, lustrous plates, which are not greasy, though they are soft to the touch. It is insoluble in water, but dissolves readily in ether, and, to a lesser extent, in hot alcohol. The so-called "stearin" of which candles are made is not true stearin, but stearic acid, as noted above. The stearins may be prepared artificially by heating stearic acid with glycerin, provided too high a temperature is not attained; the resulting compound being monostearin, distearin, or tristearin, according to the proportion of the mixture, the temperature to which

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