By James Heinz
A U.S. Navy tug that towed ships around the Pacific during World War II and an old passenger ferry cutdown to a barge are now an articulated team on the Great Lakes. Occasionally, this odd couple visits Milwaukee’s harbor.
The tug is one of three former war machines still sailing on the Great Lakes.
This is a story of a mighty tug, and a ferry that hauled trains, cars and passengers between Wisconsin cities and Ludington in Michigan until improved rail and highway routes through Chicago rendered it obsolete.
The tug was built as a Sotoyomo class rescue tug ATR-126 in 1943 at Port Arthur, Texas, by Gulfport Boiler and Welding Works. A year later she was reclassified as an auxiliary ocean tug and commissioned by the Navy as ATA-199.
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This 143-foot (44 meters) vessel had a beam of 33 feet (10 meters) and a draft of 13 feet (4 meters). It was built with two General Motors Cleveland diesel engines with an electric propulsion motor with a single screw. It could move at a speed of 13 knots (15 miles per hour). As a Navy vessel it required 45 men to run her. Its armament consisted of one 3″ .50 caliber gun and dual 20 millimeter anti-aircraft guns.
According to Wikipedia, the tug towed a variety of ships and barges around the Pacific. Most noteworthy was ATA-199 towing the disabled destroyer USS Hugh Hadley. The ship had shot down twenty-three Japanese airplanes at Okinawa, but was hit by three kamikazes. The tug towed her to California, where the Hadley was scrapped.
On August 25, 1947, the tug was decommissioned in Orange, Texas, assigned to the Atlantic Reserve Fleet, and renamed UNDAUNTED. Later the tug was transferred to the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries, then loaned to the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy at Kings Point, New York, as a training vessel. She was renamed again, this time T/V KINGS POINTER.
In 1993 the tug was sold to Basic Towing of Escanaba, Michigan, and renamed KRYSTAL K. Pere Marquette Shipping of Ludington bought the tug in 1998. This time she was retitled to her original name, UNDAUNTED. Pere Marquette rebuilt her as an articulated pusher tug, receiving a Hydraconn connections system and an elevated pilot house.
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Her companion started as SS CITY OF MIDLAND 41, a train ferry on Lake Michigan for the Pere Marquette Railway and its successor, the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway. The ferry was built by Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company in 1940. The vessel was one of the last coal-burning ferries on Lake Michigan.
The vessel’s specifications included two Skinner Unaflow steam engines that gave her speeds up to 20 miles per hour. This double-decker ferry was 406 feet long (123.75 meters) with a beam of 58.2 feet (17.74 meters). She had 72 staterooms, and could carry 50 automobiles and 34 freight railcars.
During the busy summer months, the ferry’s run between Manitowoc and Ludington served as a moving connector of U.S. Highway 10. She was dubbed “Queen of the Lakes” because of her amenities, size and esthetics.
Because the vessel’s engines were similar to those used on the Casablanca-class escort carrier, she was used for training by the U.S. Coast Guard and the Navy.
In 1947, the CITY OF MIDLAND 41, with its parent company, was merged into the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway. In 1983, the C & O ended its ferry routes and the vessel, along with two others, were purchased by Glen Bowden and George Towns. They folded the vessels into the Michigan-Wisconsin Transportation Company. The ferry made its last run in November 1988.
After left rusting at Ludington’s harbor for nine years, the CITY OF MIDLAND 41 was converted to a barge. Today that barge is PERE MARQUETTE 41, integrated with the tug UNDAUNTED.
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Photo top: PERE MARQUETTE 41 tethered to UNDAUNTED, Muskegon, Michigan, 2002.
Photo Credit: Great Lakes Marine Collection – Milwaukee Public Library / Wisconsin Marine Historical Society (Photographer: Chuck Sterba)
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made her last run in November 1988, and later was converted to a barge named PERE
MARQUETTE 41. The ship is shown docked in Manitowoc, Wisconsin. Date unknown.
Photo credit: Great Lakes Marine Collection – Milwaukee Public Library / Wisconsin Marine
Historical Society
machines still sailing on the Great Lakes. During World War II, the tug towed ships around the Pacific. She now drives a freight barge called PERE MARQUETTE 41 on Lake Michigan. The barge
was once a train and passenger ferry moving between Wisconsin ports and Ludington, Michigan.
Photo Credit: Great Lakes Marine Collection – Milwaukee Public Library / Wisconsin Marine
Historical Society. (Photographer: Chuck Sterba)
ferry cutdown to a barge are now an articulated team on the Great Lakes. Occasionally, this odd couple visits Milwaukee’s harbor. The barge began as the SS CITY OF MIDLAND train ferry
shuttling between Wisconsin ports and Ludington, Michigan. Built by Manitowoc Shipbuilding Company in 1940, she was reduced to a barge about 1997.
Photo Credit: Great Lakes Marine Collection – Milwaukee Public Library / Wisconsin Marine
Historical Society (Photographer: Chuck Sterba)
MARQUETTE 41 on the Rouge River, Dearborn, Michigan, in 2007. The former U.S.
Navy tug, which saw action in World War II, was married to the barge many years
later after it was cutdown from its former heyday life as a train and passenger
ferry moving passengers between Wisconsin ports and Ludington, Michigan.
Photo Credit: Great Lakes Marine Collection – Milwaukee Public Library / Wisconsin
Marine Historical Society (Photographer: Craig Olson)
James Heinz is the Wisconsin Marine Historical Society’s acquisitions director. He became interested in maritime history as a kid watching Jacques Cousteau’s adventures on TV. He was a Great Lakes wreck diver until three episodes of the bends forced him to retire from diving. He was a University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee police officer for thirty years. He regularly flies either a Cessna 152 or 172.
