is a product of one of the most remarkable
shipyards on the Great Lakes . Between 1870 and 1903, well
after most major shipyards had made the inevitable transition
to steel hulls, Captain James Davidson's yard in West Bay
City, Michigan, stretched the limits of wooden boat technology,
eventually making some of largest wooden ships on the Great
Lakes and some of the longest ever intended for deepwater
navigation (see, for example, the Pretoria
).
 |
Captain
James Davidson |
Davidson's
long preference for wooden hulls was due less to a reverence
for tradition than to simple economics. Davidson's competitors
faced huge capital outlays as they retooled their yards and
retrained their workforces to build steel ships. Most, in
fact, did not survive the transition. Davidson, however,
spared himself the jolts of converting to steel. He exploited
the supply of prime oak in the nearby Saginaw River area,
stuck with his well-trained work force and well-equipped facilities,
and pushed the art of wooden boat building to its limits.
For many years, the strategy paid off. Davidson's inexpensive
but efficient wooden boats continued earning him large profits
until the Great Depression.
The
Frank O'Connor represents one of Davidson's many technological
advances. Originally called the City of Naples, it was built
in 1892 with two sister ships, the City of Venice and the
City of Genoa. These three ships were the first of Davidson's
300-foot wooden bulk carriers. To reach these lengths, Davidson
devised innovative ways to strengthen the
hulls
with
iron and steel strapping. The City of Naples measured
301 feet in length, 42 feet 6 inches in breadth, and 21 feet
3 inches in depth of hold. It had a
gross tonnage
of
2,109 and, as originally configured, could carry nearly 2,600
tons of coal or 100,000
bushels
of grain. Despite their anachronistic
building materials,
the "Italian city" boats were driven by state-of-the-art,
triple-expansion steam engine
.
continued
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