King & Winge (fishing schooner)
Encyclopedia
The King & Winge was one of the most famous ships ever built in Seattle, Washington, United States. Built in 1914, in the next 80 years she had participated in a famous Arctic rescue, been present at a great maritime tragedy, and been employed as a halibut schooner, a rum runner, a pilot boat, a yacht, and a crabber. She sank in high seas, without loss of life, in 1994.
schooner
built by the King and Winge shipyard
in West Seattle in 1914. She was designed by Albert M. Winge, co-owner of the shipyard. Her dimensions were 143 tons, 97' length on the deck (110' overall), 19.6' beam and 9.7 depth of hold. As built she was fitted with a 140 hp Corliss gasoline engine and an electric lighting system. She had two 60' high masts, and carried nine halibut dories
. The construction was very strong, with 4x4 ½ inch oak frames, each set six inches apart, and sheathed with planking three inches (76 mm) thick, covered with another layer of ironbark sheathing. The schooner was divided into four watertight compartments, her hull was heavily braced, and her bow was nosed with steel plates for ice work.
fishery, she was chartered before construction was complete by the Hibbard-Swenson Co. for an expedition to the Arctic for hunting, trading, and making a motion picture.
Captain Olaf Swenson
and C. L. Hibbard took King & Winge up to Nome
, where they found the U.S. revenue cutter Bear
. Earlier that season, Bear had attempted to rescue the Stefansson
expedition survivors, stranded in the Arctic since the sinking of their ship Karluk, crushed by ice in the Chukchi Sea
in January. Bear had been forced to abandon the rescue effort by weather conditions and had returned to Nome to refuel. Swenson returned to Seattle for business reasons, but Hibbard and the navigator A.P. Jochkimson decided to go to Wrangel Island
to look for the survivors, leaving a day ahead of the Bear.
Once arriving at Rodgers Harbor, on September 7, they found and took on board the three survivors there, and then went through huge ice floes to Waring Point, where they took on board nine more. Sailing back south, they met the Bear and turned over the rescued men to the coast guard cutter.
The account above follows the H.W. McCurdy Marine History of the Pacific Northwest. A somewhat different account, with Swenson on the King & Winge with Jochimsen and commanding the umiak that landed on Wrangel Island is given by Burt McConnell, a contemporary eyewitness, and other sources. The origin of this difference is unclear.
. On October 23, 1918, coming south down Lynn Canal
south from Skagway in a snowstorm, the Princess Sophia had struck Vanderbilt Reef, not far from the Sentinel Island Light. She was hung up high on the reef for a considerable time, and her captain apparently thought that she could be floated off at the next high tide. Consequently no attempt was made to transfer the passengers to the King & Winge or the lighthouse tender Cedar, which, with a large number of smaller vessels, had heard of the wreck and gone to the Sophias aid. The sea conditions were bad, and any attempted transfer would have been risky in any case. Overnight, however, the wind came up, and the Sophia was washed off Vanderbilt Reef and sank with all 343 people aboard. Only the upper part of her mast remained above the water. All that the Cedar and the King & Winge could do was pick up floating bodies and take them to Juneau.
. In the meantime, she had become legally encumbered as security for a loan. In 1922, she was sold to Northwest Trust & Savings Bank to satisfy the loan. In 1923, she was sold at auction to E.L. Skeel, otherwise unidentified. Skeel was possibly a pseudonym or stand-in for Roy Olmstead
and T. J. Clarke, two former policeman who had opted for a substantially more lucrative career in the rum-running business, Prohibition
having recently come into law. Clarke and Olmstead tried and failed to reregister the King & Winge as a Canadian vessel, and so the King & Winge passed into the possession of the Columbia Bar Pilot's Association.
pilot boat
from 1924 to 1958. She was called the Columbia by the pilot's association. In 1924, she was converted from gasoline to diesel power. She served under the command of Captain F.E. Craig, who estimated he had made more than 50,000 crossings of the bar in her. In 1944, she returned to Seattle to be refit to Coast Guard standards as CGR-2469. Many of the men who worked on the refit had helped build her.
bought King & Winge from the pilot's association, with the objective of restoring her as a sailing ship. How much progress Dr. Parlova made is not entirely known. Among other things, he restored her masts and the name King & Winge and paneled the pilothouse with Tennessee cherry wood. King & Winge was the official flagship of the 1958 Astoria Regatta. In late 1961, Jack Elsbree, of Seattle, a retired airline pilot, bought the King & Winge from him and brought her up to Lake Union
in Seattle, with the same objective, that is, of restoring her to her original state. In 1962, she was sold to Wilburn Hall, who took her to Kodiak, Alaska
for crab fishing
. Hall is credited with pioneering the modern king crab
fishery in the Bering Sea
. In 1987 she was sold to Richard Maher of Homer, AK, who operated her as a longliner for halibut and blackcod
and as a tender, as well as a crabber.
The King & Winge survived into modern times, sinking in 18 feet (5.5 m) waves in the Bering Sea
, 22 miles (35.4 km) West of St. Paul Island on February 23, 1994. Attempts to save the flooding vessel failed and all four crew members were rescued by the USCG cutter Hamilton
.
Construction
King & Winge was originally a powered halibutHalibut
Halibut is a flatfish, genus Hippoglossus, from the family of the right-eye flounders . Other flatfish are also called halibut. The name is derived from haly and butt , for its popularity on Catholic holy days...
schooner
Schooner
A schooner is a type of sailing vessel characterized by the use of fore-and-aft sails on two or more masts with the forward mast being no taller than the rear masts....
built by the King and Winge shipyard
King and Winge Shipbuilding Company
The King and Winge Shipbuilding Company was an important maritime concern in the early 1900s on Puget Sound. The shipyard was located at West Seattle. The owners were Thomas J. King and Albert M Winge. King was born in Boston and learned to build ships under the famous Donald McKay. He came to...
in West Seattle in 1914. She was designed by Albert M. Winge, co-owner of the shipyard. Her dimensions were 143 tons, 97' length on the deck (110' overall), 19.6' beam and 9.7 depth of hold. As built she was fitted with a 140 hp Corliss gasoline engine and an electric lighting system. She had two 60' high masts, and carried nine halibut dories
Dory
The dory is a small, shallow-draft boat, about long. It is a lightweight and versatile boat with high sides, a flat bottom and sharp bows. They are easy to build because of their simple lines. For centuries, dories have been used as traditional fishing boats, both in coastal waters and in the...
. The construction was very strong, with 4x4 ½ inch oak frames, each set six inches apart, and sheathed with planking three inches (76 mm) thick, covered with another layer of ironbark sheathing. The schooner was divided into four watertight compartments, her hull was heavily braced, and her bow was nosed with steel plates for ice work.
Rescue of the Stefansson expedition
While her builders had planned to put King & Winge in the halibutHalibut
Halibut is a flatfish, genus Hippoglossus, from the family of the right-eye flounders . Other flatfish are also called halibut. The name is derived from haly and butt , for its popularity on Catholic holy days...
fishery, she was chartered before construction was complete by the Hibbard-Swenson Co. for an expedition to the Arctic for hunting, trading, and making a motion picture.
Captain Olaf Swenson
Olaf Swenson
Olaf Swenson was a Seattle-based fur trader and adventurer active in Siberia and Alaska in the first third of the 20th century. His career intersected with activities of notable explorers of the period, and with the Russian civil war. He is credited with leading the rescue of the Karluk...
and C. L. Hibbard took King & Winge up to Nome
Nome
Nome may refer to:A country subdivision:* Nome an administrative division within ancient Egypt.* Nome , the administrative division immediately below the peripheries of Greece Places:* Nome, Norway* Nome, Alaska, US...
, where they found the U.S. revenue cutter Bear
Bear (ship)
The Bear was a dual steam-powered and sailing ship built with six inch thick sides which had a long life in various cold-water and ice-filled environs. She was a forerunner of modern icebreakers and had an exceptionally diverse service life...
. Earlier that season, Bear had attempted to rescue the Stefansson
Vilhjalmur Stefansson
Vilhjalmur Stefansson was a Canadian Arctic explorer and ethnologist.-Early life:Stefansson, born William Stephenson, was born at Gimli, Manitoba, Canada, in 1879. His parents had emigrated from Iceland to Manitoba two years earlier...
expedition survivors, stranded in the Arctic since the sinking of their ship Karluk, crushed by ice in the Chukchi Sea
Chukchi Sea
Chukchi Sea is a marginal sea of the Arctic Ocean. It is bounded on the west by the De Long Strait, off Wrangel Island, and in the east by Point Barrow, Alaska, beyond which lies the Beaufort Sea. The Bering Strait forms its southernmost limit and connects it to the Bering Sea and the Pacific...
in January. Bear had been forced to abandon the rescue effort by weather conditions and had returned to Nome to refuel. Swenson returned to Seattle for business reasons, but Hibbard and the navigator A.P. Jochkimson decided to go to Wrangel Island
Wrangel Island
Wrangel Island is an island in the Arctic Ocean, between the Chukchi Sea and East Siberian Sea. Wrangel Island lies astride the 180° meridian. The International Date Line is displaced eastwards at this latitude to avoid the island as well as the Chukchi Peninsula on the Russian mainland...
to look for the survivors, leaving a day ahead of the Bear.
Once arriving at Rodgers Harbor, on September 7, they found and took on board the three survivors there, and then went through huge ice floes to Waring Point, where they took on board nine more. Sailing back south, they met the Bear and turned over the rescued men to the coast guard cutter.
The account above follows the H.W. McCurdy Marine History of the Pacific Northwest. A somewhat different account, with Swenson on the King & Winge with Jochimsen and commanding the umiak that landed on Wrangel Island is given by Burt McConnell, a contemporary eyewitness, and other sources. The origin of this difference is unclear.
Charter work and fishing
The King & Winge was chartered by the US Coast and Geodetic Survey for two seasons wire-drag work in Alaska. Subsequent to this assignment she was sold to the National Independent Fisheries Company in 1916 and worked in the halibut fishery.Wreck of the Princess Sophia
In October 1918, the King & Winge was present at one of the great tragedies of Alaskan maritime history, the wreck of the Princess SophiaPrincess Sophia (steamer)
The SS Princess Sophia was a steel-built coastal passenger liner in the coastal service fleet of the Canadian Pacific Railway . Along with the SS Princess Adelaide the SS Princess Alice and the SS Princess Mary, the SS Princess Sophia was one of four sister ships built for CPR during 1910-1911.On...
. On October 23, 1918, coming south down Lynn Canal
Lynn Canal
Lynn Canal is an inlet into the mainland of southeast Alaska.Lynn Canal runs about from the inlets of the Chilkat River south to Chatham Strait and Stephens Passage...
south from Skagway in a snowstorm, the Princess Sophia had struck Vanderbilt Reef, not far from the Sentinel Island Light. She was hung up high on the reef for a considerable time, and her captain apparently thought that she could be floated off at the next high tide. Consequently no attempt was made to transfer the passengers to the King & Winge or the lighthouse tender Cedar, which, with a large number of smaller vessels, had heard of the wreck and gone to the Sophias aid. The sea conditions were bad, and any attempted transfer would have been risky in any case. Overnight, however, the wind came up, and the Sophia was washed off Vanderbilt Reef and sank with all 343 people aboard. Only the upper part of her mast remained above the water. All that the Cedar and the King & Winge could do was pick up floating bodies and take them to Juneau.
Rum-running career
The King & Winges history in the early 1920s is reported to be obscure. In the fall of 1921, National Independent Fisheries Company chartered her to the Cape Flattery Pilots Association, to operate as a pilot boat at the western entrance of the Strait of Juan de FucaStrait of Juan de Fuca
The Strait of Juan de Fuca is a large body of water about long that is the Salish Sea outlet to the Pacific Ocean...
. In the meantime, she had become legally encumbered as security for a loan. In 1922, she was sold to Northwest Trust & Savings Bank to satisfy the loan. In 1923, she was sold at auction to E.L. Skeel, otherwise unidentified. Skeel was possibly a pseudonym or stand-in for Roy Olmstead
Roy Olmstead
Roy Olmstead was one of the most successful and best-known bootleggers in the Pacific Northwest region of the U.S.. A former lieutenant in the Seattle, Washington, police department, he began to bootleg part-time...
and T. J. Clarke, two former policeman who had opted for a substantially more lucrative career in the rum-running business, Prohibition
Prohibition
Prohibition of alcohol, often referred to simply as prohibition, is the practice of prohibiting the manufacture, transportation, import, export, sale, and consumption of alcohol and alcoholic beverages. The term can also apply to the periods in the histories of the countries during which the...
having recently come into law. Clarke and Olmstead tried and failed to reregister the King & Winge as a Canadian vessel, and so the King & Winge passed into the possession of the Columbia Bar Pilot's Association.
Columbia bar pilot boat
King and Winge was the Columbia BarColumbia Bar
The Columbia Bar is a system of bars and shoals at the mouth of the Columbia River spanning the US states of Oregon and Washington. The bar is about wide and long....
pilot boat
Pilot boat
A Pilot Boat is a type of boat used to transport pilots between land and the inbound or outbound ships that they are piloting.-History:The origins of the word pilot probably disseminates from the Latin word pilota, a variation of pedota, the plural of pēdón which translates as oar...
from 1924 to 1958. She was called the Columbia by the pilot's association. In 1924, she was converted from gasoline to diesel power. She served under the command of Captain F.E. Craig, who estimated he had made more than 50,000 crossings of the bar in her. In 1944, she returned to Seattle to be refit to Coast Guard standards as CGR-2469. Many of the men who worked on the refit had helped build her.
Later history
In 1958, Dr Clyde C. Parlova of Astoria, OregonAstoria, Oregon
Astoria is the county seat of Clatsop County, Oregon, United States. Situated near the mouth of the Columbia River, the city was named after the American investor John Jacob Astor. His American Fur Company founded Fort Astoria at the site in 1811...
bought King & Winge from the pilot's association, with the objective of restoring her as a sailing ship. How much progress Dr. Parlova made is not entirely known. Among other things, he restored her masts and the name King & Winge and paneled the pilothouse with Tennessee cherry wood. King & Winge was the official flagship of the 1958 Astoria Regatta. In late 1961, Jack Elsbree, of Seattle, a retired airline pilot, bought the King & Winge from him and brought her up to Lake Union
Lake Union
Lake Union is a freshwater lake entirely within the Seattle, Washington city limits.-Origins:A glacial lake, its basin was dug 12,000 years ago by the Vashon glacier, which also created Lake Washington and Seattle's Green, Bitter, and Haller Lakes.-Name:...
in Seattle, with the same objective, that is, of restoring her to her original state. In 1962, she was sold to Wilburn Hall, who took her to Kodiak, Alaska
Kodiak, Alaska
Kodiak is one of 7 communities and the main city on Kodiak Island, Kodiak Island Borough, in the U.S. state of Alaska. All commercial transportation between the entire island and the outside world goes through this city either via ferryboat or airline...
for crab fishing
Alaskan king crab fishing
Alaskan king crab fishing is carried out during the winter months in the waters off the coast of Alaska and the Aleutian Islands. The commercial harvest is performed during a very short season, and the catch is shipped worldwide...
. Hall is credited with pioneering the modern king crab
King crab
King crabs, also called stone crabs, are a superfamily of crab-like decapod crustaceans chiefly found in cold seas. Because of their large size and the taste of their meat, many species are widely caught and sold as food, the most common being the red king crab, Paralithodes camtschaticus.King...
fishery in the Bering Sea
Bering Sea
The Bering Sea is a marginal sea of the Pacific Ocean. It comprises a deep water basin, which then rises through a narrow slope into the shallower water above the continental shelves....
. In 1987 she was sold to Richard Maher of Homer, AK, who operated her as a longliner for halibut and blackcod
Sablefish
The sablefish, Anoplopoma fimbria, is one of two members of the fish family Anoplopomatidae and the only species in the Anoplopoma genus...
and as a tender, as well as a crabber.
The King & Winge survived into modern times, sinking in 18 feet (5.5 m) waves in the Bering Sea
Bering Sea
The Bering Sea is a marginal sea of the Pacific Ocean. It comprises a deep water basin, which then rises through a narrow slope into the shallower water above the continental shelves....
, 22 miles (35.4 km) West of St. Paul Island on February 23, 1994. Attempts to save the flooding vessel failed and all four crew members were rescued by the USCG cutter Hamilton
USCGC Hamilton (WHEC-715)
USCGC Hamilton was a U. S. Coast Guard high endurance cutter based out of San Diego, California. Launched December 18, 1965 at Avondale Shipyards near New Orleans, Louisiana and named for Alexander Hamilton the first United States Secretary of the Treasury and founder of the United States Revenue...
.
External links
Photographs
- King & Winge, in more recent times (accessed January 19, 2008)
- King & Winge as pilot boat and in ice
- Princess Sophia on Vanderbilt Reef, October 24, 1918 (accessed January 19, 2008)
