❖ The Sweet SIGHTSEER ❖

SIGHTSEER (ex-VASHONA)

Click to enlarge.
Pre 1954. 

Original photo from 

the Saltwater People Historical Society©

“I spent a wonderful day in, I believe, 1961, cruising from Leschi Park to Pier 56, and return. I had written the Gray Line asking for a job. They offered me a ride instead. I spent time in the pilot house, engine room, and passenger cabin. She was maintained like a yacht. 
      When we lived above Lake Washington in the 1950s and early 1960s, I could hear her mellow whistle blow when she docked at Leschi Park at 5 pm, every day."
      The above quote was shared this day by mariner Jack Russell, Seattle. He owns Sternwheel Charters, LLC, and can be reached at 206-850-7648.

  

SIGHTSEER (ex-VASHONA)

ON 221333
99 G.t / 53 N.t. Passenger vessel.
110.1' Reg. L x 22.9' b x 22.9' x 6.5 d

1921. Built by John Martinolich at Dockton for Tacoma-Quartermaster Harbor route of the Vashon Navigation Co.

1926. SIGHTSEER received the engine from UTOPIA.

1931. Now too large for the dwindling passenger traffic on her route; it was replaced by the small freight, passenger vessel CONCORDIA, built Tacoma.

1946. Mrs. John L. Anderson sold SIGHTSEER (ex-VASHONA) to Grayline Tours of Seattle for the continuation of the Lake Washington Ship Canal-Puget Sound run instituted by the late Captain John L. Anderson.

1963 SIGHTSEER, out of service.

Above stats from The H. W. McCurdy Marine History of the Pacific Northwest. Edited by Gordon Newell. Superior Pub. 1966.

     

❖ Waterfront Pageantry ❖

VIRGINIA V, 

steaming into Elliott Bay, Seattle, WA.

Date between 1934-1939.
Original photograph from the James A. Turner Collection,

Saltwater People Historical Society©

 

"We were young and full of vinegar in those early years of Seattle's Puget Sound Maritime Historical Society [PSMHS]. Steamboat races, tugboat races, and pyrotechnics were frequently on our minds. Action we wanted and action we got--action mixed with history--a novel combination. Our first big endeavor was to race on Elliott Bay the last of the inland passenger steamers in an epic contest for the crown.

SIGHTSEER on Lake Washington, Seattle.
Dated 1936
Click image to enlarge.
Original gelatin-silver photo from the 
Saltwater People Historical Society.

SIGHTSEER (ex-VASHONA)
Original photo from the
James A. Turner Collection,
Saltwater People Historical Society archives© 

Pitted against each other were the venerable steamers VIRGINIA V and the SIGHTSEER, skippered by Captain 'Howling' Parker and Captain Harry Wilson, respectively. This led to the annual Elliott Bay tugboat races, sponsored by the PSMHS for many years and involving scores of tugs of all sizes and horsepower, coming here from as far as Alaska to the north and the Columbia River to the south, with a generous sprinkling of Canadian challengers as well. We started a nationwide show, one that was copied in several large American ports.

      Then came that featured race between the last of the sternwheelers--the SKAGIT CHIEF, SKAGIT BELLE, and W. T. PRESTON.

SKAGIT CHIEF,  SKAGIT BELLE, and W. T. PRESTON 
Churning up Elliott Bay 

20 August 1950.
The course of the Seafair event ran from 

Magnolia Bluff to the foot of Lenore Street.

Click image to enlarge.
Race sponsored by the 

Puget Sound Maritime Historical Society.
Photo by Larry Dion for the Seattle Times©.
Original gelatin-silver photograph from the archives of the 

Saltwater People Historical Society©

The black horse PRESTON took the honors. And when the annual Seafair rolled around, the destruction of Neptune's ship fell in our hands, and Elliott Bay was the scene of the fiery end of many worn-out hulls including the historic BELLINGHAM, the first ship of the Alaska Steamship Co., Black Ball Line, and Northland Transportation Co.

Photo by James A. Turner, Seattle, WA.
Date and event unknown.
Original photo from the archives of 
the Saltwater People Historical Society©

Those were rip-snorting days of fun and frolic, and we salty dogs and dock wallopers really lived it up.
Text by Jim Gibbs
The Sea Chest
Quarterly membership journal of the Puget Sound Maritime Society
June 1969