The Last Virtually Unaltered Classic Laker Showing Off Some Beauty

Saginaw arriving for fuel and iron ore on a gorgeous summer afternoon! This video features not one but two different arrivals, one from the classic Canal vantage point, the other from about 4 miles away, high up on the hillside in Brewer Park, taken about a week earlier. The old White Lady showing off her stuff for the summer crowds! Also featured is the Vista Queen tour boat, Vista Star’s little, rarely seen sister. Seen the Star hundreds of times but have never caught the Queen up close on camera before! Slippery little boat that comes and goes on a fairly random schedule!

With the fire on Cuyahoga (a return to service for her currently appears doubtful) and hull issues on Michipicoten (potentially expected to return but depends on the final results of her inspections and repairs, so not guaranteed) the Saginaw sails as Canada’s oldest lake ship for the time being. Built in 1953, she remains nearly unaltered from when she was first constructed as the John J Boland, aside from engines that were replaced in 2007 and an unloading boom that had to be replaced in 1973 after the original one collapsed and fell apart. While to someone unfamiliar with lakers this work may sound significant, it pales in comparison to what many of these ships have gone through, getting cut apart, lengthened, widened, gutted out to install unloading systems and put back together again and in some cases cut apart yet again. The Saginaw meanwhile, continues to sail with her original configuration.

One of only 3 self unloaders constructed during the 1950s (the other two being John G Munson and the long gone Detroit Edison) what is now known as the Saginaw was constructed in Manitowoc, Wisconsin and sailed for the American Steamship company until 1984 when the company put her into long term layup with no intentions of returning her to service, following a large influx of new vessels into their fleet. She sat in port for 8 years awaiting the scrapyard along with the rest of the company’s older vessels, but made a surprise return to service and a mild modernization in 1992, once again for American Steamship. Six years later she was returned to retirement, her name was scrubbed off and given to a newer fleetmate, and the ship was advertised for scrap.

Instead she was picked up by a startup company from Canada, Lower Lakes Towing which operated a handful of small, extremely old ships as their newest and largest (at the time) vessel. The company used her to great effect, hauling cargo between often overlooked ports and using her relatively small size and versatility to their advantage. She helped build the company into one of the largest and most successful new fleets the Great Lakes has seen in decades, a reputation that has now been severely tarnished in the last few months due to a handful of severe incidents that have made major news headlines across both countries, including one vessel coming incredibly close to ending up in the depths of Lake Superior. In response to these incidents, they cleaned up the Saginaw slightly, she had been starting to look incredibly rough with massive wear and tear on the hull and visible patches. Some paint was added to her bow, and the patches were smoothed out and reinforced to be proper hull plates, but because they never took her out of the water to do it, the work is clearly halfhazard and rushed, with most of the hull still displaying wear and tear. Despite this, she somehow does look a lot better in comparison to the last time I saw her in daylight, so mission accomplished… I guess.

Hopefully she gets some actual attention in the future though! She deserves the best treatment in the Lakes! Another noteworthy aspect of her (not seen in this video sadly) is one of her crew has a dinosaur costume, which sometimes comes out and dances around the deck as they pass by!So if you ever see Saginaw pass by, keep an eye out for the ship’s pet T-Rex!