Ron Bloomfield's Maritime Bay County Ties Together Vital Local History
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Maritime Bay County is a new Arcadia Publishing book compiled by Ron Bloomfield for the Bay County Historical Society.
Davidson, Wheeler, Defoe.
The stories of those men, and their shipyards, are a defining part of Bay County history.
For the first time we now have the total package, produced by Ron Bloomfield of the Bay County Historical Society, in a new book "Images of America: Maritime Bay County."
This Arcadia Publishing volume ($21.99) is a worthy successor to similar volumes on general Bay County history put together by Leon Katzinger, retired school principal and former president of the Historical Society.
The 215 historic photos provide a broad panorama of maritime life in Bay County, some so rare the book makes history itself. For instance, see page 122 of motorboat racers preparing for a race during the Eastern Michigan Water Carnival in 1929. The driver standing on the dock, dressed in white, appears to be Hilda Mueller, a 21-year-old lass, readying for her first race. The following year she was the only woman in the U.S. to win a national championship in outboard motorboating that year.
Likewise, the photo of Defoe's P.C. (Patrol Craft) 451 on page 84 is that of a history-making vessel. P.C. 451 was the prototype of swift sub-chasing vessels ordered by President Franklin D. Roosevelt from Defoe in 1938, before the breakout of World War II.
The reason FDR ordered the ship from Harry J. Defoe remains a mystery. But perhaps the pair had a connection from World War I when FDR was assistant secretary of the Navy and Defoe produced minesweepers and other vessels.
The text of the book is contained in extensive and well-researched cutlines under the photos. They tell the story as well as pages of narrative and, because of the illustrations, perhaps better.
This 128 page volume will surely prove a delight to anyone who has grown up here in the decades after World War I. And it is a treasure for marine buffs of all ages because of its scope, analytical approach and outstanding photos.
Rarely seen photos such as the one on page 15 of Capt. James Davidson's tug Howard, jammed fast against Third Street Bridge by the ice, with crowds watching from the bridge. will serve as startling reminders of the past to those familiar with the river.
Trombley House floating down the river to Veterans Park on a Stender barge, little-known fire tugs guarding huge piles of lumber, the experimental boatbuilding of Ben Huskins, the Eddy-built Quonset huts in Washington Park -- all help the reader span the years and revive memories in indelible fashion.
The crystal-clear cover shot of the launching of the steamship Thomas Cranage at the Davidson yard in 1893 fairly leaps off the page because of its clarity. The poignant images of excited children jumping for joy at the launch and its white water wake are once-in-a-lifetime scenes preserved for all time like the paintings of the Old Masters.
Other local maritime aspects like Capt. Ben Boutell and his fleet of tugs, the Eddy Shipbuilding Co., Baycraft, Bay City Boats, Les Staudacher's unlimited hydroplanes, the Gougeon Brothers and their sailing catamarans and iceboats, passenger steamboats that plied the river and bay as far north as Alpena, even ice fishing shanty towns on the bay -- all serve to complete the historical record of Maritime Bay County. We highly recommend this book.###
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