A WET CHAPTER OF LIFE ON LAKE UNION

SURFSIDE 9 
(ex-Four Winds, ex-Liberty,
ex-Ballard, ex-City of Everett)
Click image to enlarge.
Built in 1900 at Sumner Iron Works.
22 July 1966
Photo by George Carkonen.
Original gelatin-silver photo from the archives
of the Saltwater People Historical Society

The Surfside 9 restaurant, 900 Westlake Avenue, sank in Lake Union this day and was resting with one side on the bottom in about 24-ft of water.

      The restaurant was converted from a ferry in 1950. It formerly was the Four Winds.
      A cook, Doulglas Leach, 23, discovered the craft sinking this morning when he arrived at work about 9 o'clock.
      Pumps which normally pump leakage from the bilge were not operating.
      Soon the dining room, kitchen, and bar were flooded with water that reached table-top level.
      Police Patrol boats were sent to the scene. A fire boat was called to try to pump water out of the restaurant, owned by Union Enterprises and operated by George Nelson.
      Nelson said City Light had turned off power to the boat two previous because of an unpaid light bill.
      Nelson said:
      "We went to City Light yesterday and told them we had the money, but they woundn't come down. The electric pumps which normally pump water from the bilge weren't working."
      Nelson said that if the power had been on, the bilge pump probably would have kept the boat from sinking.
      He declined to estimate damage, but said the restaurant would operate again.
      City Light restored power, but too late for the bilge pumps to do any good, Nelson said.
      Police said cables holding the boat to a pier probably prevented it from rolling over. They said their pumps were making little headway. They doubted the boat could be refloated with the equipment they were using.

      Once the water was above the boat's waterline, it easily seeped through weather-shrunk sides.
      As policemen attempted to pump the boat out, a piano floated around in the cocktail lounge and tropical fish swam in a glass container just a few inches above lake water within the boat.
      In her prime she carried 400 passengers and 40 automoblies.

Seattle Times, Seattle , WA. Published 22 July 1966.

Restaurant ships have been highly successful in British Columbia, Oregon, and California cities but they have not done well in Seattle.

1967: Seattle diver Leiter Hockett raised the Surfside 9 to be purchased by A.W. (Monty) Morton for his Youth Services. After several months of cleaning and refurbishing by the young people of Morton's organization, the old vessel sank at her moorings again and gradually disintegrated.
She sank one day before a scheduled dry-dock rehabilitation that would have guaranteed the 68-year old boat further service as a youth center. 

A lawsuit, resulting from the 1966 sinking, was still pending at the time of  a sinking in 1968. She lingered for a few years before disintegrating.

 

COLONISTS TO SAN CRISTOBAL ISLAND

 

Friends and family bid farewell
to the old motorship ALERT as it sails
from Seattle carrying the first load 
of colonists to San Cristobal Island 
in the Galapagos Archipelago. 
The leaders hope to have a cooperative 
colony of 500 people settled on the island
off the coast of Ecuador by autumn. 
Photo date May 1960.
Low-res scan of a gelatin-silver photograph 
from the archives of
the Saltwater People Historical Society©

A report the following spring. 

Seattle Times, 6 March 1961

"The Galapagos Island group is no place for a 'gringo,' according to Charles Harrison Jr, Kenmore, who was the last of the Seattle-area colonists to leave the islands with his family.
      Harrison, his wife, and two sons, Ronnie, 15, and Mike, 13, were glad to be back at their home today after nearly a year's absence.
      That year included six months of living 'like animals' on San Cristobal Island, where the colonization venture of a group of Pacific Northwest families fell flat.
      'It was HOT and uncomfortable with nothing to do to make a living. There was no organization and there never was––each family contributed $2,500 for the privilege of the so-called colonizing.
      A 'gringo' can't compete with the natives, who work for $1.50 a day. Sanitation conditions were rotten. There was no electricity the last two or three months and consequently no refrigeration.
      Most people arrived there almost broke–– We had money to get out. That's why we stuck it out as long as we did.
      San Cristobal is the only island in the group with fresh water, but you couldn't drink it without getting dysentery.'
      Harrison said the venture had cost him close to $10,000.
      'But we learned a lot. The youngsters learned to speak Spanish. They learned the ways of the natives there and learned to fish for stingrays and moray eels.
      But all the time they were there, although they were having a good time they said, they would rather be back in Seattle. They appreciate their home now."

CAPTAIN BAXTER AND HIS "BRIGANTINE"

 

Lieber Schwan
 David Baxter, aboard
his 70-ft, 1850 design
he called a "square-rigged brigantine."
Launched 1966.
Location: Friday Harbor, WA., 1983.
Tap image to enlarge.
Photo by Richard S. Heyza
from the archives of the 
Saltwater People Historical Society

They are a special breed, these San Juan boat people. They've jettisoned the soft comforts of spacious homes on the mainland and chose instead to live in cramped cabins hardly bigger than suburban coat closets.
      "Living aboard a boat is true adventure, said David Baxter who with his wife Marjorie, lived afloat for over 18 years.
      Their vessel, the Lieber Schwan, was one of hundreds crowded into the Friday Harbor marina area.
      The Baxters lived the kind of carefree life most people only dream about. They repaired or built boats, then, when the local scenery paled, they sailed away.
      But they didn't expect ever to tire of the San Juans, because they loved Washington with the frank passion that marked them as former Californians.
      In the early 1980s, Baxter retired from running a little shipyard at Morro Bay, CA. In 33 years he had built some nine boats and rebuilt many others, including boats owned by actors Dick Powell and Burt Lancaster.
      Baxter himself looked as if Central Casting sent him to play an Old Sea Dog. He was shortish, wide-shouldered, blond-haired, a galleon medallion hung over the front of his jersey, and his work-weathered fists appeared carved from oak.
      The Lieber Schwan, which he built, is an 1850-design. Baxter managed to raise the nine sails single-handedly while his wife was at the helm.
      Actually, the Lieber Schwan had a third crew member; Chula, a 5-year old Amazon parrot.
      Admittedly, the Baxters led a more comfortable shipboard life than most. They had a fireplace, shower, and a stereophonic sound.
      A huge proportion of boats cruising the San Juans are fiberglass. But Baxter preferred wooden ones. They're warmer and dryer, especially in this climate, and if they're built right the maintenance is minimal, he said.
      For a retired man, Baxter stayed pretty busy. He rebuilt two 44-foot sketches in the winter of 1982-'83.
      "We've sailed to Mexico and the Hawaiian Islands but we prefer it here, Baxter said. The climate is so invigorating."
      He also liked the relaxed pace of life in the San Juans."
      "Quitting work when friends visit in the middle of the day is what life is all about," Baxter said. "A 'manana man' like me feels right at home."

Words by Frederick Case for the Seattle-Times, June 1983.

When it was time, the Baxters sailed for Olga, Orcas Island, San Juan Archipelago, WA.

Marjorie L. "Kitty" Johnson Baxter

7 May 1937-3 Feb. 2020

ONE HAPPY CAPTAIN........ 1965

 

Captain Louis Van Bogaert
with his prize of friendship from 
craftsman Ralph Hitchcock, Seattle, 1965.
The steamer Rosalie, his sweetheart.
Original gelatin-silver photograph from the archives 
of the Saltwater People Historical Society©

"Capt. Louis Van Bogaert who retired in 1957 after 54 years on Puget Sound vessels, 
had a special fondness for one boat, the ROSALIE.
      He had gone to work on the ROSALIE as a watchman in 1910. Later he was second mate, then first mate, and finally, in 1914, her skipper. So the captain was especially happy about a gift which he took back to his home in Alhambra, CA, after a recent visit in Seattle.
      It was a bottle with a scale model of the ROSALIE in it. The model was the work of Ralph C. Hitchcock, a past president of the Puget Sound Maritime Historical Society. Hitchcock had driven from California to Seattle with Captain Van Bogaert and on several occasions, Van Bogaert had wanted to stop and look for a bottle with a shipmodel in it. But Hitchcock always found an objection.

    

Ralph Hitchcock
Ship model maker. 
Photo dated 1965, Seattle.
Gelatin-silver original photo from the archives of
the Saltwater People Historical Society.©

"I'll get you a bottle," Hitchcock kept saying.

But Van Bogaert was surprised when the bottle turned out to have a model which Hitchcock himself had made.

      Hitchcock made the model of the famous Puget Sound passenger vessel FLYER which is in the State Historical Museum in Tacoma, but the ROSALIE is the first model he ever assembled in a bottle.
      The model was in 334 pieces before Hitchcock began assembling it inside the bottle, which has a neck with a diameter only three-quarters of an inch across.
      The ROSALIE, 136 feet long, was built in Alameda, CA in 1893. She carried passengers between San Francisco and Oakland when it cost only a nickel to make the trip.
      Then the ROSALIE came to Puget Sound, but when gold was discovered in Alaska she was put into service between Seattle and the Northland. Among her skippers while she was owned by the Alaska Steamship Co., was Capt. Johnny (Dynamite) O'Brien.
      Much of ROSALIE's service was in the San Juan Islands as part of the Puget Sound Navigation Co fleet. That was where Van Bogaert served aboard her.

Steamer ROSALIE
off the coast of Lopez Island, dated 1907.
click to enlarge.
L.A. Cadwell has marked numbers on the buildings,
the schoolhouse, two churches, the Creamery,
 the Post Office, the Store, and
"part of our orchard", in the foreground.
Original photo from the archives of the 
Saltwater People Historical Society ©

The ROSALIE (L)
Click to enlarge and view the 
 Sidewheeler YOSEMITE
Steaming through the Islands.
Postcard mailed in Eastsound in 1907
Original photo from the archives of the 
Saltwater People Historical Society©

1907, July 7.

"When on the Victoria route a few days ago, the steamer ROSALIE won a fine silver service in competition with the steamer VICTORIAN in a voting contest to determine which was the more popular vessel." Good going, Rosalie!
        The ROSALIE's career came to an end 22 June 1918, when she caught fire while tied to a pier of the Duwamish Waterway and was a total loss." 

Words with no byline from the Seattle Times Oct. 1965

H A P P Y N E W Y E A R !

 

M.V. SAMISH
Dealing with some white caps to bring
in the new year near Blakely Island.
Blowing 50 at Smith Island.
Photograph courtesy of L. A. Douglas,
from his deck on Blakely Island, WA.
Wishing everyone calmer seas.