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
As surprising as a lightning bolt out of a blue sky, Cappy David Miller’s unexpected text message raised the hair atop my head.
“I’m the new owner,” he declared, “of your old paddlewheeler, CLYDE.”
Whoa, now. Let’s put all this into perspective. The CLYDE, David spoke of, was the stern paddlewheel houseboat I bought on May 17, 2012, in Alma, Wisconsin, on the Upper Mississippi River, from boat carpenter Ed Newcomb. Ed constructed the authentic-looking paddlewheeler as a tribute to his ancestors who crewed the original CLYDE, a sidewheel steamboat built in 1870 and rebuilt five years later as a sternwheel to raft first-growth Wisconsin White Pine logs from above Alma to sawmills as far downstream as St. Louis. Although the rafting trade played out before the turn of the 20th Century, the reinvented steamer CLYDE lasted until October 1941, practically to the day of my introduction into the world.
Oddly enough, when I first heard of Mr. Newcomb’s efforts to find an appropriate buyer for his beloved paddlewheeler, I already owned a fine screw-wheeler, a former towboat converted into a liveaboard on the Tennessee River on General Joe Wheeler Lake at Decatur, Alabama. However, my hometown pal, Everett Dameron, was prowling the maritime market for an interesting boat, so I informed him of the paddlewheeler available near Alma.
Around mid-May 2012, Ev and I drove to Wisconsin to look at the boat. The first time I spied the CLYDE afloat at Great River Harbor, a marina south of Alma, I imagined seeing an authentic steamboat, but in miniature. She was the “loveliest boat I ever saw afloat,” I thought as we made our way from the parking lot to the floats where the CLYDE lay alongside. As fate would have it, Everett was unable to secure the loan he needed. Before we departed home, though, I sold some idle stocks and deposited the proceeds into my checking account. With Ev no longer the buyer, Ed Newcomb and I reached an agreement, and I became the successor to the boat he lovingly created.
Leaving the CLYDE in Ed’s care, Everett and I returned home to gather supplies and equipment for the long 1,300-mile trip via the Upper Mississippi and Ohio Rivers. On June 3, we arrived back at Great River Harbor in a large U-Haul van, chock-a-block with everything Ev and I had imagined for the upcoming trip to Aurora Bend on the Middle Ohio River. Among the truckload of supplies were the 13-foot, aluminum skiff, BUSTER, and the gawd-awfully-heavy anchor off the SUN*FISH, my Tennessee River boat, along with some 200 feet of heavy-duty, one-inch, nylon line from my last professional command, the GRAND VICTORIA II casino boat in Rising Sun, Indiana, across from Rabbit Hash, Kentucky, downstream from our ultimate destination.
The Mississippi River decided to rise several feet toward flood stage before our return, so Ev and I took advantage of the delay caused by the high water to clean and upgrade the paddlewheeler while becoming better acquainted with its handling and operation. All time well invested for the long and precarious journey ahead.
A couple of days after returning to the harbor, Ed requested that we remove the glass window panels from the forward and starboard sides of the pilothouse. The forward wooden structural member of the pilothouse proved to be rotted and required replacement.
The next morning, Ed arrived with the new post he had handcrafted at home. Within less than an hour, Ed removed the old post, and the reconstructed piece looked like it had always been there. As soon as the last squeeze of caulk filled a crack, Ed stepped back and proudly exclaimed:
“There are two types of carpenters– barn carpenters and boat carpenters. And you’ll never find a barn carpenter in a boatyard.”
Although the Great River Harbor became like home to us, the river finally subsided sufficiently for our journey to begin. So on Tuesday, June 12, 2012, at 11:25 AM, after a breakfast of pancakes, bacon, and coffee, Ed Newcomb tossed off the last line of the boat he’d handbuilt, almost like another member of his family, and the CLYDE departed Great River Harbor and Alma, Wisconsin, for the last time. Twenty-nine days later, after one of the most exciting and often trying days on the river, the CLYDE arrived at her new home in Aurora, Indiana.
Details of the CLYDE’s 1,300-mile adventure, told in far-greater depth, may be found in an earlier NKyTribune column.
Over the next eight years, I spent restoring the CLYDE to her original intent, as builder Ed Newcomb envisioned her when she first came out of his backyard boatyard, not far from where his fluvial fabrication and I first met. My restoration of the CLYDE’s all-wood paddlewheel was deemed worthy of inclusion in any river museum. Captain Frederick Way, Jr.’s wooden paddlewheel at the Ohio River Museum at Campus Martius, Marietta, Ohio, influenced my rebuild, as had Captain Alan L. Bates’ “The Western Rivers Steamboat Cyclopoedium,” guided Ed Newcomb during his initial construction of the sternwheeler.
After nearly a decade of concentrated effort, I realized I could no longer give the CLYDE the attention she needed, so I began looking for my successor. At the farthest, upper reaches of the Tennessee River, a buyer came forward. After finalizing the sale on June 6, 2020, the CLYDE began the equally long trip, as I had from Alma, and the jaunty paddlewheeler found her new digs somewhere in the Knoxville area. Surprisingly, when plans for the boat didn’t work out on the headwaters of the Tennessee River, it returned by trailer to the Aurora Bend section of the Middle Ohio River.
After a somewhat uncertain year, fate again intervened in the local buyer’s aspirations. The future of the CLYDE seemed uncertain until David Miller’s text message a few days ago: “Hey — I’m the new owner of your old paddlewheeler, CLYDE.”
From what little I’ve heard so far, it’s too early to determine what Mr. Miller intends to do with “my old paddlewheeler.” Dave admits he’s not sure himself. But in the hands of a longtime riverman and owner of a spacious, well-equipped marina, the CLYDE has the brightest prospects since the day I first observed her underway as I stood on the dock watching it leave Aurora Bend.
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.
Purchase Captain Don Sanders’ The River book
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.
You may purchase your book by mail from the Northern Kentucky Tribune — or you may find the book for sale at all Roebling Books locations and at the Behringer Crawford Museum and the St. Elizabeth Healthcare gift shops.
Click here to order your Captain Don Sanders’ ‘The River’ now.