The Steamer KATE ADAMS was affection-
ately known as “Lovin’ Kate.” Her steel hull was no match for the tiny boll weevil that destroyed the cotton trade and a way of life on the Lower Mississippi.
In 1926, her owners brought her up to the Marine Ways at Paducah, KY, and had her cotton guards covered over. They intended for her to compete in the freight and passenger business along the Ohio River.
Her large size and fuel consumption made her lose money, and she was laid up along the Memphis levee, where she burned later that year. Her whistle was dug out of the Memphis mud.
You will find this wonderful essay, written by Capt. Frederick Way Jr., about the whistle’s disposition. It is well-worth the read:

“All of which is a long story and inadequate to those who remember the tremor of her decks and the deep hoot of her bull frog whistle, which could be heard for 30 miles back in the Mississippi Delta. Some years later, Capt. Dick Heirnaux brought out the towboat LEONA with a  large  single-chime whistle said to have come from the KATE: said to have been dug from the mud at Memphis. I doubted this. One day on the Cincinnati Wharfboat, an aged roustabout was half asleep on a freight pile and  I was standing  nearby.  Unexpectedly the Leona blew a blast of that whistle while coming under the suspension bridge.  Quite as unexpectedly I witnessed that old man awake and raise his head like a hound dog which has heard a wolf call on a still moonlit night.  As the vibrant deep note died away in the echoes, this old man cried plaintively: “COTTON PILE—COTTON PILE!  DAT’S DE  OL’ KATE MOANING FOR COTTON, GOD BLESS DE KATE ADAMS.” He shuffled to the doorway to look, half expecting to see two tall stacks, two swinging stages, a blue domed pilothouse, and Capt Billy Hodge at the wheel. I walked the other direction a believer.”

The Steamer J. T. HATFIELD worked the coal trade on the Ohio between Point Pleasant and Cincinnati for over 30 years. The ancient wooden coal flats she is pushing had a nasty habit of sinking.

The hand re-touched, framed giclée mounted or
(stretched) as shown, sized 30 x 48 inches,
plus 7-or-so inches for frame & brass name plate:
$1,350.00 (plus shipping and crate).

Most fans and former passengers of the Steamer DELTA QUEEN are aware that the grand old lady was towed over the open ocean from San Francisco thru the Panama Canal, up the Mississippi to Cincinnati. She was restored at Dravo Marine near Pittsburgh and then steamed down to Cincinnati to join the Greene Line in the spring of 1948.

Looking across the Ohio toward the now old GORDON C. GREENE, we see that she is sliding into shadow. After a couple of years trying to create a passenger excursion business on the Mississippi, Greene was sold into oblivion and after a series of unsuccessful owners she sank while tied up at the St. Louis levee in 1967.
Most of the old buildings along the Cincinnati waterfront were abandoned and city planners were looking ahead to recreational use for the waterfront.

Hand retouched giclée on mounted or stretched
canvas including brass title plate sized 26 x 48 inches
plus frame $1450 shipping additional

Hand re-touched giclée on mounted or stretched canvas,
framed as shown and sized 26 x 44 inches, plus frame: $1,250
(shipping and crate not included).

The Ohio River is typically navigable, year-round. If a freeze occurs, today’s steel-hulled towboats can usually make their way through the ice without difficulty. The winter of December 1917 and January
1918 were on the record books for bone- chilling cold.
The Ohio was frozen, and navigation halted by 17 December of that year. In January, a sudden thaw and upstream rain in West Virginia caused the river to gorge at Sugar Creek Bend, just downriver from Cincinnati.
With the rain and ice gorge, the river rose almost 20 feet overnight! As the pack ice began to slide by the thick oak hulls, it crushed them like toys. Below is Captain Frederick Way’s sad narrative on the CITY OF LOUISVILLE, shown across the river in the painting:

“The CITY OF LOUISVILLE” was as fabled on the Ohio as the ROB’T. E. LEE was on the Mississippi. Her great size and power called for the supreme pilots of her day. As Capt. Ed Maurer once said “When you had her hard down rattling around Sugar Creek Bend, she was a whole lot of lumber. She left Louisville on May 16th
1917. The next day she was laid up across the river at Covington and remained there until December when she was returned to Cincinnati because of heavy ice. The ice got her on January 30th 1918 after a valiant fight; she had steam up and her wheels were working ahead when she went down, drafted back and settled at the doorway of the L &C Wharfboat.

The hand re-touched giclée on mounted (or stretched) canvas is
sized 26 x 48 inches plus frame size with brass title plate :
$1450 (plus shipping and crate).