Boblo boats set out on opposite courses
Toledo — Mention the Boblo boats to a Detroit native and the memories come tumbling out.
The heat and vibration of the engines.
The tasty hot dogs from the steam table on the main decks.
The 4-foot-4 Capt. Boblo — he of the glass eye and outsized captain’s hat — greeting children nearly as tall.
The two steamships, SS Columbia and SS Ste. Claire, are still around but could turn into memories as well.
The Columbia will be moved from Toledo to Buffalo for repairs in two weeks, then remain in New York as an attraction.
The Ste. Claire, docked in Ecorse, may be scrapped if its owner, Ron Kattoo, can’t find a new home.
“I’d have no choice but to dismantle it,” said Kattoo.
The steamers moved generations of Metro Detroit residents to the Boblo Island amusement park in the Detroit River for 89 years.
Residents said they were happy the Columbia may eventually return to the water, but wish it would happen a lot closer to them.
“It’s a crying shame she can’t stay with us,” said Martha Camp of Flat Rock.
The Columbia, 113 years old, and Ste. Claire, 105, are two of the oldest steamships in the U.S.
They stopped ferrying people in 1991 when the amusement park, losing customers to Cedar Point, could no longer afford their expense.
The Boblo amusement park closed two years later, and the island is being developed as an upscale residential community.
“They were the last of their kind,” Michael Conley, a maritime historian from Taylor, said about the two steamships.
The future of the Ste. Claire may be getting a lifeline, said Kattoo, a critical care doctor from West Bloomfield Township.
The ship has languished for 20 years as its owners sought funding for its restoration.
Now it must move from U.S. Steel so work can be done on a seawall this fall.
Kattoo, who, along with another doctor bought the steamship in 2007, has tried to find a new home but has struck out with several locations.
The size and shape of the ship limits his options. He’s looking for a dock or slip that is 200 feet long and 16 feet deep.
But recent publicity about his search has led to a flurry of offers from residents, mayors and private groups, he said.
“We went from having nothing to having a dozen to 15 possible spots,” he said.
He and his partner are now sorting through the offers.
As for the delay in restoring the vessel, he attributed it to a number of factors, including a lack of money.
He had depended on revenue from continuing to use the ship as a haunted attraction but the U.S. Coast Guard said it wasn’t sturdy enough.
Kattoo said structural engineers have reviewed the ship, and he’s waiting for estimates of how much the restoration would cost.
Memories to be preserved
Residents’ memories of the Columbia could fill all three decks of the steamship, and that’s what a New York group intends to do.
The SS Columbia Project wants people to send their recollections to stories@sscolumbia.org.
The group will make a video that will shown aboard the steamship once it’s eventually sailing along the Hudson River in New York.
The plan to use passengers’ remembrances struck some as a strange juxtaposition — Michigan memories shared along a New York river.
“I have tons and tons of fond memories,” said Jimmy Cargill of Lincoln Park. “To go on that boat was an event.”
The Columbia is still several years and $15 million away from carrying passengers along the Hudson, said Liz McEnaney, executive director of the project.
When the Columbia Project arrived last year to move the steamer from Detroit to Toledo, it found the ship covered with plastic to protect it against the elements.
It looked like a ghost, said McEnaney.
Two decades of Michigan winters left the 200-foot ship in woeful shape.
The first order of business was scraping two tons of zebra mussels from the hull.
The ship had chipped paint, a rusted hull and pockmarked floorboards that had buckled.
“It’s a big project,” said McEnaney. “The boat really needs a lot of tender loving care.”
Since March, the Columbia Project has been patching numerous holes in the hull and replacing steel plates and rivets, said McEnaney.
After finishing work on the hull in Toledo, staffers will work on the rest of the ship for a year in Buffalo.
The biggest challenge after that will be reawakening the triple-expansion steam engine and its 1,217 in horsepower.
The makeover will cost $18 million. The group has raised $3 million through state grants, private foundations and individual contributions.
Experience called ‘magical’
For many Detroiters, it was a rite of passage.
Every summer, they took the Columbia or Ste. Claire to the Boblo Island amusement park.
Just like their parents, and their grandparents before that.
“My folks had to scrimp and save for these adventures but we never missed a summer,” said Michael Johnston, a former Port Huron resident who lives in Albuquerque. “It was magical on that boat.”
People met their spouses on the boats. One even had a baby while aboard one. Named her Columbia.
Part of the fun of the amusement park was the journey to get there.
The 18-mile, 90-minute trip down the Detroit River was as iconic as the corkscrew roller coaster that awaited passengers.
When boarding the ships, passengers scrambled for a deck chair along the rail or headed for the music deck.
“Music playing, bands playing, people dancing,” said Cargill. “Everybody’s in a good mood.”
Kids might take a peek at the pilot house or even get a chance to blow the steamer’s whistle.
Old-timers also enjoy remembering the Faygo Boat Song, a catchy ditty from a 1970s commercial that showed people on the boat singing about the Detroit-made soda.
The only bad experience Cargill’s family ever had was a moonlight cruise his mom took in the early 1960s.
Standing in the front of the Columbia, she became seasick when it turned around in the river.
Other than that, all the memories are good ones, said Cargill.
He still looks out at the river, hoping to catch a glimpse of the old steamer.
fdonnelly@detroitnews.com
(313) 223-4186
Twitter: @francisXdonnell