SS Christopher Columbus

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The S.S. Christopher Columbus was an excursion liner on the Great Lakes, in service between 1893 and 1936. She was the only whaleback ship ever built for passenger service, and was designed by Alexander McDougall, the developer and promoter of the whaleback design.

She was built in 1892-1893 at Superior, Wisconsin by the American Steel Barge Company. Initially, she ferried passengers to and from the World's Columbian Exposition. Later, she provided a general service to various excursion ports around the lakes.

Reportedly, at the time of her launching, she was not only the longest whaleback ever built, but at 362 feet (110 m), also the longest vessel on the lakes, earning her the unofficial title of “Queen of the Lakes”. The Christopher Columbus was said to have carried more passengers in her career than any other vessel on the Great Lakes. She was scrapped in 1936 by the Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company at Manitowoc, Wisconsin.

Motivation for her construction

White livery

The history of the Christopher Columbus is linked with the history of the whalebacks, an innovative but not widely accepted ship design of the late 1880s, and of their designer, Alexander McDougall. McDougall, a Scottish immigrant, Great Lakes captain, inventor, and entrepreneur, came up with the idea of the whaleback as a way to get barges to follow better in heavy seas. Whalebacks were characterized by distinctive hull shapes with rounded tops, lacking conventional sides. Waves thus broke across the hull with considerably less force than when striking a conventional hull. The cabins and other fittings were mounted on rounded turrets that water could flow round, giving a somewhat unusual appearance.

One half of a stereo view

McDougall met considerable skepticism, derision (observers called them "pig boats") and resistance to his proposed barge and ship designs. When he was unable to convince existing shipbuilders to try his designs, he founded the American Steel Barge Company in Superior, Wisconsin in 1888. After meeting some success on the lakes, in 1891 McDougall sent a whaleback, the Charles W. Wetmore, to London, England by "shooting the rapids" of the St. Lawrence River (she was too big to fit through the locks of the time), laden with grain where she reportedly caused a sensation. McDougall also attempted to establish a shipbuilding industry in the Pacific Northwest to manufacture his designs by having the Wetmore sail around South America laden with parts and machinery, to Everett, Washington where a shipyard was established. The Columbus was an attempt to demonstrate that the whaleback design would work in passenger service, and further that it would enable high speed, and to publicise the design in general.

Construction and initial operation at the Columbian Exposition

Hull under construction, showing turrets on which the decks are placed.

The Columbus was powered by two reciprocating triple-expansion steam engines.

Construction was carried out at McDougall's American Steel Barge Company works in Superior, starting in the fall of 1892. The hull framing, completed September 13, and the bottom were constructed first, and then the 6 Scotch boilers and the triple expansion engines were installed, followed by the rounded hull top and the 6 turrets. The ship was launched at that point, on December 3 1892. The superstructure decks were added, and she was fitted out over the remainder of the winter and spring. She had 4 decks which rested atop her 6 relatively large turrets located along the centerline of the hull.

The Columbian Whaleback Steamship Company of Duluth, Minnesota was set up by McDougall to operate her, and she was commissioned May 13 1893. Her first captain was J. McArthur, who had captained other whalebacks for McDougall's firms, starting with the first powered whaleback, the Colgate Hoyt, built in 1890. McDougall was quoted as having said to him, "There is your steamboat; take her down to Chicago and make a success of her."

McArthur did just that. Painted in all white livery, the Columbus cut a natty figure sailing from the Randolph Street dock to the Jackson Park site of the World's Columbian Exposition's Beaux arts "white city" exposition fairgrounds and back, a 6-mile (10 km) trip along the Lake Michigan shoreline. She had an estimated capacity of 4-5000 passengers on her four decks but it was reported that she carried 7000 at least once.

It was also reported that the Goodrich Transit Line steamer Virginia (later the USS Blue Ridge) raced against her. The Columbus carried 1.8 million passengers during the course of the Exposition with only one fatality, a crew member. In recognition of this success, the commissioners of the Exposition presented Captain McArthur with a gold watch engraved with a representation of the ship on the back. McArthur went on to captain other whalebacks, including the Frank Rockefeller (which became the SS Meteor, the last surviving whaleback).

Regular service

A printed pass, signed by Alex McDougall as General Manager of the Columbian Whaleback Steamship Company

Crossing under the Broadway lift bridge in Milwaukee

After the Exposition ended, she was placed in passenger service, and had an additional (fifth) deck added during the 1899-1900 winter season. Despite the success of the Columbus at the Exposition, and the promotional efforts of McDougall, the whaleback design never caught on. The Everett shipyard built only one ship, in 1894. Although that ship, the City of Everett, sailed for 29 years and was not only the first American steamship to navigate the Suez Canal, but also the first American steamship to circumnavigate the globe, by 1900 the last whalebacks had been built in Superior—the Alexander McDougall, 1899 (the last powered ship), and the John Smeaton, the last whaleback barge—and the American Steel Barge Company was sold to the American Ship Building Company, becoming their Superior Works and switching to more conventional laker designs.

Stern view at the Goodrich Dock in Chicago

By 1903, although still owned by the Columbian Whaleback Steamship Company, the Columbus operated under the auspices of the Goodrich Transit Line, whose steamer Virginia had raced her in 1893. She changed hands in 1905 to the Milwaukee & Chicago Transportation company—possibly a Goodrich holding company—and again in 1909 to Goodrich Transit Line. Her livery was at some point changed to a black hull with yellow accents, and she was placed in Chicago-Milwaukee service.

She remained with the Goodrich line for a number of years. In 1917, she was involved in a collision with a tower, damaging her pilot house. This probably happened in Milwaukee, although details are sketchy.

In 1932-33 she was featured at the Century of Progress exhibition in Chicago.

In 1933, during the Great Depression, she changed hands two more times, ending up with a scrapper, and she was scrapped at the Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company in Manitowoc, Wisconsin in 1936.

Having carried so many passengers (some sources say over 2 million total), the Christopher Columbus was one of the most photographed passenger ships of the Great Lakes, and souvenir postcards of her are still widely available.