The Steamer Fashion
The seventh documented steamboat to carry the name, the Fashion was built in 1877 at Jeffersonville, Ind., by the Howard Shipyard for a contract cost of $20,714. Constructed on a wooden hull that measured 220 feet in length by 36 feet in width, the handsome sternwheeler was propelled by engines having 17-inch cylinders with an 8-foot stroke. Three boilers supplied the steam.
Originally owned by the Louisville & Henderson Mail Line, the boat was sold within its first year of operation to Capt. W.S. Packer and other investors to run in the Pittsburgh-St. Louis trade. Packer was a former towboat man who was long connected with the firm of Riddle, Coleman & Company.
The steamboat was later sold to Capt. E.B. Cooper to replace the Emma Graham, which had sunk at Ripley Landing, W.Va., on November 26, 1885. The Fashion was then placed in the Cincinnati-Pittsburgh trade and is reportedly the first packet with twin stage planks to operate on the upper Ohio River. Capt. Cooper was also master of the vessel, assisted by A.J. Slaven, who served as head clerk and was also a shareholder.
The Fashion had but three serious accidents during its career. On October 26, 1881, the riverboat struck an underwater obstruction on the Ohio near Falling Run, which resulted in damage to bottom planks and breakage of 40 timbers in the hull. Repairs were made at the Madison, Ind., marine ways and the boat returned to service. The next accident occurred on November 1, 1882, when the steamboat struck a submerged filtering tank owned by the waterworks at Evansville, Ind., settling upon it. The towboat Hotspur rendered assistance, releasing the Fashion; the hull was discovered to have only minor leaks, so the boat was taken on to Louisville for repairs.
The final, and fatal, accident came on November 2, 1888, when, while downbound at Riggs Landing on the Ohio near the head of Manchester Island, a severe storm was encountered. Due to poor visibility, the pilot, Capt. Aaron McLaughlin (an elderly man who had run the blockade at Vicksburg during the Civil War) mistook a light in the window of a house for the government navigation beacon at the head of the island. Under a full head of steam, the Fashion struck the bank on the Kentucky side and sank.
The steamboat was a total loss, with damages to the boat estimated at $15,000. The cargo loss was set at $1,400, with much of the freight composed of Hostetter’s Bitters, a popular patent “medicine” manufactured at Pittsburgh and containing a high alcoholic content that was touted as a panacea for health ailments. Freight from the wrecked riverboat was strewn all along the bank and riverside dwellers dug bottles of the elixir out of the mud for some years afterward.
Capt. McLaughlin’s pilot partner, who was off watch at the time of the accident, was an up-and-coming young riverman named Capt. Anthony Meldahl, who had invested all of his money in the Fashion. Meldahl lost everything when the boat was destroyed, but went on to become a highly respected steamboat officer. Today, an Ohio River lock and dam is named in his honor.
Editor’s note: For questions or suggestions regarding the Old Boat Column, Keith Norrington may be contacted by e-mail at curatorkeith@yahoo.com, or by mail through the Howard Steamboat Museum at P.O. Box 606, Jeffersonville, Ind. 47131-0606.
