The riverboat captain is a storyteller. Captain Don Sanders shares the stories of his long association with the river — from discovery to a way of love and life. This a part of a long and continuing story.
By Capt. Don Sanders
Special to NKyTribune
The news that I, and many other friends and former crew mates of Ed “Seth” Smith, eagerly awaited finally arrived. An email from Dean R. Millius read, “Cap’n Don, Ed got in!!! He got a ton of votes.” What Mr. Millius was referring to, of course, was the recent selection of Ed Smith into the National Rivers Hall of Fame located at the National Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium in Dubuque, Iowa.
The late Ed Smith began his long career on the river aboard the art deco-style sidewheeler ADMIRAL in St. Louis, Missouri. Most likely, Mr. Smith started on deck, for he remained quite proficient in the arts of a skilled deckhand throughout his life.
However, most remembered as a fireman, Ed kept the boilers hot and the steam gauges sizzling, generating the life breath of the fire-eating aquatic dragons better known as steamboats. Besides the ADMIRAL, Ed fired the Steamers AVALON and the DELTA QUEEN.
Ed and I met on my first day, around June 1959, aboard the AVALON on what started as a challenging occasion. Both my parents furiously opposed my wanting to work on what they called a “carnival boat.” At the same time, the Chief Steward, Amol Warner, forgot that he’d hired me the afternoon before, a 17-year-old boy freshly graduated from high school. He had told me to show up early the next morning to begin work as a Cabin Boy serving orange and grape mixtures concocted in 5-gallon glass jugs — usually found in office buildings as water coolers.
Somehow, my stern father reluctantly consented to drive me to the Cincinnati Public Landing where the AVALON lay moored to the cobblestone grade below the vast Greene Line Steamers, Inc. floating wharfboat. Mr. Warner, once I pleaded and invoked the name of Captain Arthur J. “Red” Schletker, pilot and relief captain, remembered that he’d indeed hired me and written my name on a long-ago-used matchbook cover, instructed me to go toward the bow and take a seat on the hard wooden bench and wait until he finished his breakfast.
Mr. Warner assured me that he would eventually be out to assign me to a cot within a small, steel incubator oven alongside the boilers, which passed for quarters for three other cabin boys besides myself. Instead of leaving after dropping me off at the AVALON, my disapproving father glared from the family car parked ashore.
Amid all my misgivings and anxieties of my first day employed as a Cabin Boy on the boat, two veteran black boatmen came around the knuckle forward the cabin of the Boiler Room, and I overheard the conversation they directed toward me:
“Who’s that white boy?”
“I don’t know, but he won’t last long…”
They were firemen Charles “Bubba” Chinn and Ed Smith, the men who kept the fires burning beneath the boilers of the steam-powered riverboat. By the end of that summer of 1959, Ed and Bubba had become treasured, lifelong friends and mentors.
Thus, Ed Smith and I met and would remain friends for life. Over the years, I learned that the esteemed fireman was dear to everyone who knew him. He was especially respected and cherished by Captain Ernest E. Wagner and Captain Clarke C. “Doc” Hawley, the commanding officers of the AVALON and DELTA QUEEN, who considered Ed Smith to be on equal grounds with them as men and steamboat crewmen.
When a drunken crewmember attacked and repeatedly stabbed Mr. Smith during a winter layover of the AVALON, both captains donated their blood, which kept their friend and cherished co-worker alive. After recovering, Ed liked to remind Captain Hawley,
“I got your blood flowing in me, now.”
The original article I wrote about Ed “Seth” Smith for the NKyTribune first appeared on Sunday, March 17, 2019. As Captain Doc and I talked on the phone about material for the story, Cap’n Hawley mentioned, almost matter-of-factly.
“You probably realize that Ed Smith saved the DELTA QUEEN from disaster a couple of times.”
Captain Hawley continued to elaborate how Mr. Smith, at extreme peril to his own personal life and limb, and without hesitation or reservation, put his life at risk to save the passenger-laden, wooden-cabin steamboat from particular danger, including the likelihood of explosion and fire. Undoubtedly, without Ed Smith’s actions, the Steamer DELTA QUEEN, along with countless passengers and crew, would have perished, according to Captain Hawley’s verification of the dual near-tragic incidents.
The last paragraph of the original March 17, 2019, Ed Smith column made this appeal to whoever was willing to listen:
“Almost 30 years have passed since Ed died. Still, he is remembered and cherished by all who knew him. There’s even some chatter going around about nominating Ed for the National Rivers Hall of Fame in Dubuque, Iowa. If anyone ever on the river deserves the honor, it is undoubtedly Ed Smith.”
Five entire years passed without hearing even the faintest echo in response to my suggestion, until a message from Dean R. Millius earlier this year said that Ed Smith was one of four finalists for the coveted National Rivers Hall of Fame honors. Again, this column featured an appeal for votes to get Ed into the Hall of Fame.
Just recently, I heard, again from Mr. Millius, that Fireman Ed “Seth” Smith will join the immortal ranks with other Mississippi River notables, including Mark Twain, W. C. Handy, Capt. John Streckfus, Captain Frederick Way, Jr., and Captains Wagner and Hawley, at the National Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium in Dubuque.
The site for Ed Smith’s induction ceremonies into the National Rivers Hall of Fame remains undecided. But wherever it occurs, many of Ed’s supporters, myself included, hope that it will be sometime next Spring, 2026, in St. Louis, where Ed’s many family members and friends will have easy access to attend this historical event.
Captain Don Sanders is a river man. He has been a riverboat captain with the Delta Queen Steamboat Company and with Rising Star Casino. He learned to fly an airplane before he learned to drive a “machine” and became a captain in the USAF. He is an adventurer, a historian and a storyteller. Now, he is a columnist for the NKyTribune, sharing his stories of growing up in Covington and his stories of the river. Hang on for the ride — the river never looked so good.
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Capt. Don Sanders The River: River Rat to steamboatman, riding ‘magic river spell’ to 65-year adventure is now available for $29.95 plus handling and applicable taxes. This beautiful, hardback, published by the Northern Kentucky Tribune, is 264-pages of riveting storytelling, replete with hundreds of pictures from Capt. Don’s collection — and reflects his meticulous journaling, unmatched storytelling, and his appreciation for detail. This historically significant book is perfect for the collections of every devotee of the river.
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