This is an abbreviated version for newspaper of an earlier post titled “Man Overboard on the Steamboat Carrie Brooks.” To see the entire article, click here.
The steamboat CARRIE BROOKS chugged along down the icy Muskingum River one frigid winter day in the 1870's. Engineer Cliff Crane was on duty in the engine room. Near Malta-McConnelsville, Ohio, Crane stepped out on the stern to oil the bearings of the paddlewheel shaft. Spray from the paddlewheel had left a coating of solid ice. He slipped and fell overboard. A potential disaster was unfolding.
Crane floundered in shock from the freezing water, struggling to stay afloat in his heavy clothing. The CARRIE BROOKS steamed on without slowing, unaware he was overboard. Crane began shouting frantically for help as he struggled toward shore. He wondered who could possibly hear him in the middle of January when farm fields were deserted. Miraculously, James Loughridge heard Crane and found him clinging to willows along the shore.
Loughridge helped the shivering Crane to his house. Most people would have been relieved to be rescued and in a warm house. But Crane was babbling, panicked that his absence placed the CARRIE BROOKS in danger. Loughridge tried to calm him. Crane asked if there was a horse available. He had to catch up with his boat before it was too late.
Danger? Before it was too late? Crane knew his absence was a danger. As the engineer, he played a critical a role. The steamboat pilot steered but relied on the engineer in the engine room below to change speed or direction. Steamboat pilots communicated with the engine room using a system of bells. The on-duty engineer upon hearing a bell, rang back an acknowledgement to the pilot and made the changes requested. But without Crane, there was no one to slow the boat for the stop at Hooksburg, just upriver of Windsor (now Stockport). Imagine the peril of a vehicle cruising at full speed with the accelerator to the floor - and no brakes.
The CARRIE BROOKS pilot steered around a bend in the icy river towards the dock at Hooksburg. He rang a bell to slow for docking. No answer. What? Anxiously he rang the stopping bell to stop the engines. No answer. For the first time, he realized no one was in the engine room. Heart pounding, he lunged at the pilot wheel, steering the boat out into the river to avoid the dock and yelled for another crew member to slow the boat. The CARRIE BROOKS swung slowly around, barely missing the dock.
The crew now knew engineer Cliff Crane was missing. The boat turned back upriver to search for him. All eyes scanned the water and shorelines for hours. They found nothing. With heavy hearts, they called off the search and continued down river.
Meanwhile, Crane was given dry clothes and a horse drawn carriage. The race was on to catch the CARRIE BROOKS at Windsor lock. The CARRIE BROOKS approached the lock. The crew saw the lock tender cranking open the lock chamber. And there was another man standing there. It was Cliff, the missing-and-presumed-dead engineer! The crew were amazed and overjoyed at seeing Cliff Crane whom they had given up for lost.
Steamboat travel could be hazardous to boats, crew, and passengers. Boiler explosions, mechanical breakdowns, damage from obstructions ("snags") in the river, and collisions were all too common. The CARRIE BROOKS once experienced mechanical failure and was damaged on the Ohio River when she struck a barge.
But that day on the CARRIE BROOKS, it was a happy ending. Tragedy was averted. There was no damage to the boat. Like the biblical story of the prodigal son, Cliff Crane was "lost but was found."
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