Page 22. MAINE COASTAL NEWS March 2014


help themselves and were hoisted on board followed by the body of Nettcher. They were landed in Boston Wednesday evening and taken to the Relief hospital.


HISTORY FROM THE PAST - Bangor Daily Commercial - Early 1900s easier to shape at the mill.


The SALLIE B. was built in Philadelphia,


in 1861. About fi ve years ago she was bought by Capt. Joel Hopkins, T. F. Cassidy and the Sterns Lumber Co., of this city, and has since been engaged in coasting, mostly sailing out of Bangor during the summer. She was 256 tons net and valued at about $2,000, without insurance.


The schooner was repaired at Belfast, during the winter and was in good shape for an old vessel. Capt. Hopkins has been in command for about two years, succeeding his father, the late Capt. Joel Hopkins. He formerly was engaged in the grocery business on lower Exchange street, Bangor, and for several years previous to taking command of the SALLIE B. ran a store on Upper Main street, Brewer. He had always shown a fondness for the sea and after his father’s death, closed out his business in Brewer and assumed command and management of the vessel.


30 April 1906


Sch. CAMPBELL Sunk Off Camden Machias Three Master’s Bow Stove in by Log and Went Down Quickly. Rockland, April. 30. The sinking in 115 feet of water of the three-masted schooner, WILLIAM F. CAMPBELL of Machias, was reported Monday when Capt. W. H. Strout of Milford, the commander and a third owner, arrived here and fi led a protest.


The schooner was bound from New


York for Belfast and Bangor with fertilizer. While sailing at the rate of eight knots an hour early Sunday morning between the northern end of Fox Islands and Camden, she struck what appears to have been a large log which knocked in the port bow. The vessel commenced to fi ll rapidly and sank within ten minutes. Meantime Capt. Strout and his crew of four out off in a small boat. After the schooner sank they returned but found no trace of her or of any obstruction. They then rowed to Camden. The schooner was built at Cherryfi eld in 1893, was 211 gross tons, 112.8 feet long, 29.5 feet wide and 8.3 feet deep. She was valued at $7000 and uninsured.


The cargo was insured. The cargo was valued at $12,000.


1 May 1906 The Ship Knee King


“Uncle Rufus” Hamm of Bangor Enjoys that Distinction. Maine Knees Famous


Bangor’s Veteran Dealer Sends Thousands of Them to New York Shipyards Every Year. It is said that Noah, the fi rst mariner, started the industry in ship knees when he discovered that the tough bend where (?) and tree trunk join was the best thing with which to brace the timbers of his ark and guarantee the fi rst inhabitants of the earth a safe voyage over the food. That may all be true about Noah, and he may have been as famous an old mariner as folks say he was, but in three days the newspapers were not doing business and Noah never had the pleasure of seeing a fi ne half-tone of himself in the public print and hearing himself spoken of as the whole thing in the ship knee trade. There is a man living in Bangor today who could probably give Noah cards and spades and then beat him when it came to telling what a good ship knee is and how much it is worth. That man is Rufus Hamm who lives in a large brick house on Third street, where two great oaks in front of the


house stand as a sort of mute token of the man who has taken so many of their kind to make timbers to brace good ships for their voyages across the seas. “Uncle Rufus” Hamm as he is known by shipping men the country over probably knows more about ship knees than any other man in the country today. He handles thousands of the knees every year and many of them are sawed out at his yard at the Smith Planing Mills in Brewer from when they are shipped to yards in New York and Brooklyn.


The invention of iron vessels with steel supports brought about a change, and today the picturesque ship knee trade is becoming a relic of the past. The state of Maine, which used to turn out ship knees by the million, now does a comparatively small business; and one must search the New York waterfront thoroughly before coming across a ship knee merchant’s yard. There are only four or fi ve such merchants. Maine has only three dealers in these once indispensable goods.


The timber is cut from hackmatack or larch, spruce and oak, which last was used more formerly than now. According to the purpose for which it is designed, the ship knee must be from six inches to two feet in diameter, with the proportion of three and a half feet of root to fi ve feet of trunk. It can be readily seen that this angular brace, meant by nature to support trees against the gale, is also unsurpassed as a stiffener of wooden ships amid the pounding waves. No thickness of hull plank or plentitude of ribs could make up for the lack of the knotty and gnarled bracers in the old-fashioned craft. Binding heavy timbers together and upholding the decks, the knees saved many a China Sea trader from the straining wrath of the typhoon and many a whaler from the relentless grip of the Arctic icefl oe. “Give me a ship with solid timber knees and I’ll sail to Hades in her,” said an old salt who lounged near the Stetson yard. “You can see the strength and you know it’s there. What do you know, except the builder’s say-so, about the iron boat? Yes, and didn’t Peary go north last summer in a timber craft? He knew the ice would squeeze him and he trusted to them logs of Maine.”


The best hackmatack trees are found in swampy land, while the spruce grow on high ground. Sometimes in prospecting for ship knees the careless operator digs away too much moss and thereby kills an entire grove of trees, the roots being exposed to the rigorous winter of the north. An experienced man can tell the available trees without much digging. There must be one large root extending out at nearly a right angle, and in its absence the tree is left alone. Having located the specimen, the man digs around the tree and cuts off all but the selected large root. There is no tap root with these evergreens, which spread their many shallow supports about, and the leverage of the lofty trunk soon brings her tree to earth. Then the trunk is sawed off from three to fi ve feet above the base.


In the old way a man would carve out four ship knees a day with the (?) load them on his ox cart and take them to the dealer. Now a revolving steel belt, which is a saw, and an automatic planer, fi nish 200 knees a day. The planning and squaring of the rough timber to market dimensions reduce it about one-third. A further reduction occurs in the shipyard.


The ship knees from Maine, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia are sent to New York by sea, while consignments from interior states go by rail. The merchant prefers the speedy rail service but laments the freight bill, owing to the weight of green timber. The green wood, be it known, is


Besides building wooden ships, knees are used in railroad fl oats, ferry and tug boats, bathhouses and derricks, always as bracers. The navy yard drydocks contain a number of them. A fi ve-masted sailing vessel requires some 500 knees. The same ship in the old days used 1000, because of the upper deck and a policy of surplus strength. It was thought best then to prepare for icebergs and ice shores; now knee pieces and a good insurance are held more economical. Also, it is said that the old system took up too much space. A three inch brace is worth 55 cents, a 12-inch diameter is valued at $14, and the sizes still larger mount up to fancy fi gures. The very biggest are used in the New England shipyards for some belated sail-propelled leviathan. Sometimes thin sections serve for ribs in rowboats, and the seafaring men even, build their houses with them so as to gain a cosey nautical effect. At these prices, which have remained pretty constant for half a century, the knee is often worth more than the entire tree, proving the geometric axiom of a part being less than the whole, not always correct. They tell here in Maine of a man who began life with a peddler’s pack, but he discovered the gold mine in ship knee timber, and by wise investments has become wealthy. Many a forest acre looked at askance by the ordinary lumberman yields a handsome revenue to the ship-knowing expert. The farmers put in their odd time digging out knees and take them to the storekeeper in payment of grocery bills; the storekeeper, in turn, sells them to the dealer, and thus the farmer’s homely toil is linked with the straining craft that seven seas.


sail the


Usually the dealer’s representatives lease forest land and pay the owner 25 percent of the value of all knees cut. This is called stumpage, which has nothing to do with the fact that few stumps are eligible for the purpose. A lumber stump is usually too short, and begins to decay after a couple for years. The science of the dealer comes in play when he makes a survey or estimate of the tough hewn knees, for the payment is made upon as estimate of sizes. Neither party cares to be mulcted by accident or device. Sometimes the dealer wins in the guess, and sometimes the farmer. Since the wearing out of the older fi elds, Michigan and Minnesota have been sought as good ship knee territory. The Adirondacks in New York state are also supplying the timber, and the south finishes the oak variety. Nothing so combines strength with preservation as does the hackmatack. “Uncle Rufus”, the principal ship knee man in Maine, and perhaps the country, handles 15,000 to 25,000 timbers in a year. Despite his 80 years he is as spry as a youngster, attends to his business at home and travels all over the country twice a year, looking after lands and contracts. He is a forty-niner who went to California around the Horn. He attributes his hale age to a life in the open and abstinence from all stimulants. When he began dealing in ship knees the iron vessel was a novelty, predicted soon to disappear, and also predicted to extinguish the demand for wooden braces. Neither has happened. A glance at a mossy strip of bark on a knee timber is enough for “Uncle Rufus” to tell all about the history and antecedents of the tree. He loves the northern forests and delights in legends of phantom animals, talking trees and birds. The marvelous strength of woodsmen is a favorite topic. The lumbermen say that Uncle Rufus himself is still stronger than three ordinary axe


wielders. 4 May 1906


Chas. Wyman Morse


Capitalist and His Rapidly Growing Steamship Lines. Already Has Eleven


Is After Panama Railroad Steamship – Sketch of Career of Former Ice King. Charles Wyman Morse, Bath boy, capitalist, and one time “Ice King,” has almost secured a monopolistic control of the Atlantic coast steamship trade, freight and passenger, of North and South America, according to New York advices to the following effect: Mr. Morse has already brought the controlling interest in 11 coastwise lines, which he has consolidated into four main systems. He is now negotiating for several other lines, including the Panama Railroad Steamship line. His actual purchase of steamship companies to date represent in stock and bond issues $33,000,000. He has behind him over $320,000,000 of capital to assist him in gaining control of the other lines for which he is negotiating. In the inner circles of Wall Street it is regarded as certain that Mr. Morse within a very short time will be the absolute dictator of all sea transportation between the ports of North and South America on the Atlantic coast, and that he will then realize his ambition to consolidate all the Atlantic coast lines into one great shipping monopoly. The companies which Mr. Morse already controls through his recent negotiations are the Clyde Steamship company, the Metropolitan Steamship company, the Metropolitan Steamship company and the Eastern Steamship company. He has also been in control for some time of the Hudson Navigation company, which is a large feeder of Atlantic coast lines.


In the Eastern Steamship company,


Mr. Morse has consolidation the Portland Steamship company, the Boston and Bangor Steamship company, the Kennebec Steamship company and the International Steamship company.


This line does practically all the freight, passenger and maritime business between St. John and Boston. At Boston the coastwise business is taken over by the Metropolitan Steamship company to Richmond. Beginning at New York and operating along the whole Atlantic coast between Boston and Wilmington, North Carolina, Norfolk, Virginia, Georgetown, North Carolina, Charleston South Carolina, Brunswick, Georgia, Jacksonville, Florida, and Santo Domingo, the Clyde line continues business with 22 vessels valued at $5,776,000. This line in 1905 earned $4,228,568.


Besides the Panama Railroad Steamship


line, Mr. Morse is understood in Wall Street to be negotiating for the purchase of control of these companies: The United Fruit company, the New York and Cuba Steamship Mail company, the Old Dominion and the Porto Rico Navigation company. Indeed, there is authority for the statement that Mr. Morse is already fi nancially interested in four of these concerns, and that he is now practically assured of gaining control of all of them. If he does he will become the undisputed monarch of the Atlantic coast trade.


As soon as Mr. Morse realizes his ambition, it is his plan, according to excellent authority to consolidate all the lines into one great system.


Secretary of State Elihu Root is a stockholder in Mr. Morse’s National bank of North America, and a warm personal friend of the new Steamship King. It is


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