Dispatches from the Samuel Center

In Front of USPS Moses Kill

Captions often contain clues, but only if you read them right. In this case, I read the last word of the caption as “hill,” and as a result sabotaged myself. When I tried a search for “Moses Kill,” I succeeded immediately, and thanks to my late friend Fred Wehner’s Travels of Tug 44. Moses Kill…

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Captions often contain clues, but only if you read them right. In this case, I read the last word of the caption as “hill,” and as a result sabotaged myself. When I tried a search for “Moses Kill,” I succeeded immediately, and thanks to my late friend Fred Wehner’s Travels of Tug 44. Moses Kill was a location along the old Champlain Canal near Fort Edward.

Some success, however, does not answer all the questions. For example, this tugboat is called Thos. what?

Certainly the person in the foreground is paying attention. But what should happen next here?

The Thos. tug is alongside the barge that dominates the lower right side of the image, but is it attached? There are at least four more barges in this image. Is that a wood product loaded onto the two in the middle distance? Firewood?

Is there a taut line running between the foreground barge and the figures to the left near the building by the towpath? Those figures, are they two people, a person and two draft animals, or something else like a cart? If so, are the tug and the draft animals working against each other?

Any ideas? Help me understand all this in the comments below.

Thanks to Bill Hecht for cleaning up this image from the CSNY and to Fred for leaving his site live.

6 responses to “In Front of USPS Moses Kill”

  1. Lee Rust Avatar
    Lee Rust

    That thin line looks awfully skinny when compared to the dock lines bunched nearby on the deck, plus it’s perfectly straight and doesn’t lead in any logical direction. Since it appears as a grainy part of the image rather than a distinct physical mark on the print, it’s most likely a scratch on the negative from which this cyanotype was made. That printing process was most popular from the mid-1880’s through the 1890’s, so it gives a clue as to when the photo was taken.

    Reply
  2. Lee Rust Avatar
    Lee Rust

    The tug appears to be the ‘Thomas Miller Jr’

    https://www.northcountryatwork.org/archive-items/the-thomas-miller-jr-tugboat-on-the-champlain-canal/

    Reply
    1. tugster Avatar
      tugster

      Lee- Congratulations. You’ve identified the tugboat. And you submitted another image of the boat. I’m just curious: what process did you follow to get there? Thanks much.

      Reply
  3. Kyle Stubbs Avatar
    Kyle Stubbs

    Looking at the mystery image you posted of the tugboat on the Champlain Canal, I first went to throw together a list of likely candidates.

    Judging from the cyanotype printing, the caption space at the bottom, and the image proportions, I am assuming that this is a postcard from the pre-divided back era, which in the US most likely means it dates to between about 1902 and 1907. With that in mind, I took a look at the 1905 MVUS, and see the following screw-driven vessels classed for “Inland Towing” and named “THOS” or “THOMAS” on the register with a hailing port in New York (there were none out of Vermont):

    THOMAS DICKSON – 24950 – 67GT – 74.8′ x 19.0′ – 1872 at Sleightsburg, NY
    THOMAS FLANNERY – 145791 – 72GT – 70.2′ x 19.1′ – 1898 at Tottenville, NY
    THOMAS MILLER JR – 145194 – 15GT – 44.1′ x 10.7′ – 1878 at Eddyville, NY

    THOMAS TRACY – 76789 – 59GT – 69.3′ x 18.5′ – 1889 at Perth Amboy, NJ (as JACK DYKMAN)
    THOMAS WALSH – 24955 – 76GT – 84.0′ x 18.3′ – 1873 at New York, NY
    THOMAS WILSON – 145484 – 71GT – 73.8′ x 18.0′ – 1888 at Buffalo, NY
    THOS. A. QUIGLEY – 80759 – 45GT – 57.6′ x 16.0′ – 1880 at Brooklyn, NY (as W.H. BENTLEY)
    THOS. B. WATTSON – 24764 – 134GT – 97.0′ x 26.6′ – 1868 at Chester, PA

    THOMAS F. MADDEN – 145582 – 17GT – 47.2′ x 13.2′ – 1891 at Buffalo, NY

    Since it was a good middle ground in size, and had a name that would be a decent fit for the size of the nameboard, I started with the THOS. A. QUIGLEY, and was able to find an image of her as W.H. BENTLEY showing a much more substantial tug with a pilothouse a deck above the main deckhouse. With that in mind, it narrowed to candidates down to the two much smaller vessels, THOMAS MILLER JR and THOMAS F. MADDEN.

    Fortunately, I soon was able to find an image of the “THOS. MILLER JR” in the collection of Mystic Seaport, which is clearly a match to the vessel at Moses Kill.

    http://mobius.mysticseaport.org/detail.php?module=objects&type=related&kv=489924

    Thanks for an interesting little research project.

    -Kyle

    Reply
    1. tugster Avatar
      tugster

      Kyle- This is an amazing response and process as well. Like Lee Rust, you came up with not only the answer but a second image of Thos. Miller Jr.. I went another step and learned that her registry is a port on the D & H Canal. Thanks for taking on this research project.

      Reply
  4. Lee Rust Avatar
    Lee Rust

    Using DuckDuckGo… I searched for “tugboat Thomas Champlain Canal”

    Reply

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