Lake Erie’s First and Last Great Official Steamer Race – Fall 1992
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The Great Lakes… 84% of the continent’s fresh water… a different story in every drop.
By Kathy Warnes
The greatest marine steam sporting event ever held on the Great Lakes began on the balmy morning of June 4, 1901. Thousands of spectators lined the Cleveland, Ohio, waterfront to watch.
The spectators inspected the steamer, City of Erie, owned by the Cleveland and Buffalo Transport Company, while she was moored in the Cuyahoga River. Passengers hurried ashore. Stevedores unloaded her freight cargo on the deck.
She had just arrived in Cleveland early that morning on her regular run from Buffalo, but her return trip was scheduled to be anything but routine. There were ripples of excitement among the debarking passengers and the people lining the decks and waterfront offices. They were waiting for the race to begin between the City of Erie and the steamer Tashmoo, from Detroit.
The Tashmoo, nicknamed “The White Flyer,” was the pride of her owners, the White Star Line. Yesterday, the Tashmoo had steamed into Cleveland harbor and spent the night behind the breakwater, watched over by her captain, B. S. Baker, well-known Detroit skipper.
The weather seemed to favor the race. The surface of Lake Erie seemed as smooth as the cloudless blue sky. The breeze whispered gently and did not work itself into one of the famous short-notice Lake Erie gales.
Aboard the City of Erie, Captain Hugh McAlpine prodded the already busy crew to stow the lifeboats on the lower deck to eliminate wind resistance and for the same reason — take down the flagpoles. Sweating men readied the engines for the race, and Chief Engineer Rendall was everywhere at once, trying to insure that nothing would go wrong. Below decks, firemen stoked the coal and discarded all stony-looking pieces that might turn into fire-box clinkers. Every crew member on the City of Erie was staking his life, sacred honor and in many cases, worldly fortunes on the race. They and the Ohioans at the waterfront cheered the City of Erie with fervor.
The backers of the Tashmoo were just as loud. Detroiters and people from along the St. Clair and Detroit Rivers were in the crowd betting on and cheering on their sleek, river speed queen. The Tashmoo backers chartered the passenger steamer Frank E. Kirby and crowded her decks to follow the race down the lake.
CITY OF ERIE on its maiden voyage packed full of passengers celebrating the commemorative event. Image courtesy of the Alpena County George N. Fletcher Public Library.
Men of reputation and fairness were chosen to be judges and time keepers for the race, such well-known marine men as Captain Charles L. Hutchinson, John A. Donaldson, Percy W. Rice, Waldo A. Avery and Arnold C. Saunders. Government inspectors watched to see that no laws were broken. The racing course for the two extended straight along the south shore of Lake Erie, starting from a line off the waterworks crib six miles outside of the Cleveland breakwater and ended at a line ten miles off Presque Isle lighthouse at Erie, Pennsylvania, almost one hundred miles. The nearest point of land was at Fairport, Ohio, where the steamers would pass about two and one half miles off shore. Engineers mapped out two lanes on the course to keep the racing steamers at least half a mile apart, broadside, start to finish. The lanes were marked by buoys and small boats anchored along the course.
The two captains drew lots to determine starting positions. Captain B. S. Baker of the Tashmoo won. He chose the outer course because this gave the Tashmoo deeper water in some of the stretches, which would add to her speed.
It was a few minutes past nine thirty in the morning when the City of Erie glided slowly down the narrow Cuyahoga River to Lake Erie to meet the Tashmoo. The two steamers worked abreast of each other as they neared the starting line. Each shut off her engines.
The little cannon on the tug boat at the starting line boomed, bells clanged aboard the steamers and their paddle wheels churned the water. Harbor boats blew their whistles and factory whistles joined in until the air vibrated.
Records show that the City of Erie crossed the starting line a few seconds ahead of the Tashmoo, but slowly the Tashmoo caught up. The two steamers ran bow to bow for about an hour. Swells from the wash of the steamers battered the shore and clouds of smoke, steam and spray followed.
As they reached Fairport, Ohio, the Tashmoo crept ahead one ship’s length; then two, then three. Gloom settled over the City of Erie, but Captain McAlpine said, “Wait until we are past this shoal water and then see what we’ll do when we strike that deep water ahead.”
At Fairport, the ships passed two and a half miles off shore and were hailed by cheering spectators. Businesses closed for the day, schools were let out and nearly everyone in Fairport was at the shore. Past Fairport, as the steamers cleared the shoal water, City of Erie shortened the lead of the Tashmoo.
TASHMOO underway with passengers spread through the three levels of the vessels upper decks. Image courtesy of Alpena County George N. Fletcher Public Library.
The steamers thrashed past. Ashtabula Harbor and City of Erie pulled abreast of the Tashmoo. Gradually she forged ahead and when they passed Conneaut, the City of Erie was about two lengths ahead. Twenty miles from the finish line, the City of Erie was three lengths in the lead.
Newspaper reporters aboard the racing steamers assigned to cover the event had to use their ingenuity to get their reports ashore and into their city rooms. Some used carrier pigeons. As one ship or the other would change position, the reporters would scribble the news on a small sheet of tissue paper, fasten it to the bird’s leg and turn it loose. When the pigeon reached home, willing hands took the paper and hurried the message to the newspaper. Some reporters tossed their messages overboard in sealed tin cans. Small boats waiting at predetermined spots along the route grabbed the cans and hurried ashore to the telegraph.
The City of Erie maintained her lead from twenty miles short of the finish line until both steamers chugged across it. The officials in the timekeepers’ and judges’ boats marking the finish line were tossed around in the turbulence as the giant racers beat water, but their stop watches weren’t stopped from recording the close finish.
The prow of City of Erie crossed the finish line just forty-five seconds ahead of Tashmoo. The only way the watchers on shore at the finish line in Erie knew for certain which ship had actually won was by a prearranged signal from the judges’ boat. Three kites sailing in the summer breeze told the people ashore the City of Erie was the winner.
The race was so close that Captain B. S. Baker double-checked to make sure he had indeed lost. When he knew he was the loser, Captain Baker saluted the winner, then both steamers turned around in the din of whistles from other steamers at the finish line and returned to Cleveland at a slower pace.
This was the last great (official) race between two large steam boats on the Great Lakes. Maritime officials frowned upon such races for safety reasons and shipowners weren’t too anxious to expose their vessels to the strain and expense.
Aged Racers
Both the Tashmoo and the City of Erie suffered tragic old ages. The City of Erie made her last trip for the C & B Line between Buffalo and Cleveland in the fall of 1937. That winter she was moored alongside her sister ship, the City of Buffalo at the East Ninth Street Pier in Cleveland. In March of 1938, the City of Buffalo caught fire and burned. The City of Erie escaped the flames, but not the wreckers’ tools.
The trim, white Tashmoo met a similar fate. Her last voyage was down the Detroit River for an evening cruise on June 18, 1936. She carried about fourteen hundred passengers, most of them dancing and having a good time. In the dark the Tashmoo hit what is believed to have been a loose rock in the channel and tore a gaping hole below the water line.
She headed immediately for the nearest dock which was at Amherstburg on the Canadian side. With her orchestra still playing and her passengers still dancing, unaware of their peril, the Tashmoo rushed to dock. All of the passengers were safely landed and a major lake disaster narrowly averted.
The Tashmoo sank at the dock soon after stopping in about fifteen feet of water, with her upper decks still well above water. Her owners eventually abandoned her to wreckers. The Tashmoo’s career ended the same as the City of Erie’s, but for a brief moment in time, they shared the distinction of setting new speed records in Great Lakes history.
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