Record Crowd Attends 23rd Annual River Bell Awards Luncheon
The 23rd River Bell Awards Luncheon, benefiting the Seamen’s Church Institute, attracted a record crowd of nearly 600 people, raising more than $500,000, also a new record.
The event, held at the Paducah-McCracken County Convention and Expo Center in Paducah, Ky., was held December 7. SCI was founded in 1834 and has grown to become the largest and most comprehensive mariners’ service agency in North America. Through its Center for Maritime Education, with training facilities in Paducah and in Houston, Texas, its Center for Mariner Advocacy, the International Seafarers’ Center in Port Newark, and Ministry on the River, SCI works to promote the safety, dignity and improved working and living conditions for those serving in the maritime workplace.
Event co-chair Damon Judd of Marquette Transportation Company announced the records for attendance and amount raised at the luncheon and welcomed those in attendance.
“As you think about Paducah, we’re clearly not the biggest city that our industry touches, but Paducah is the quintessential river town,” he said. “For those of us who live and work in Paducah, we’re really fortunate because we live in a community that really values what goes on on the other side of the floodwall and engages with us, and as you look back 26 years ago, I think that community engagement was a big part of what ultimately led to Seamen’s Church Institute launching a training facility here in town, and over the years that facility has provided critical training to thousands of mariners, contributing to a safer environment for all of us.”
The River Bell Award was presented to Darin Adrian, president of the river division of Marquette Transportation Company. The River Legend Award went to Gerald E. “Jerry” Clower, president of Harbor Towing & Fleeting LLC. U.S. Coast Guard Rear Adm. (Ret.) Richard Timme received the Distinguished Service Award. Lifesaving awards went to crews of three vessels: the mv. Mike Sanders of American Commercial Barge Line; the mv. Mary Ellen Jones of Amherst Madison Inc.; and the mv. San D of Parker Towing.
Lifesaving Awards
Mary McCarthy of Moran Towing Corporation introduced videos describing the two events encompassed by the lifesaving awards and noted that there were more than 35 nominees for the awards.
The mv. Mike Sanders and mv. Mary Ellen Jones awards were for the same series of circumstances.
About 1:15 a.m. March 9, the mv. Mike Sanders crew heard calls for help from a man who had inadvertently driven into the river from a ferry landing. He was on top of his vehicle but already knee-deep in water as it was sinking.
Working in tandem, both vessels launched their skiffs. The captain of the mv. Mike Sanders positioned his vessel to mitigate drift impact while the mv. Mary Ellen Jones’ crew got the man into their skiff. The Sanders’ skiff then stayed with the Jones’ skiff until the man was safely aboard the Jones, where he could be warmed up. Afterward, the crew ran the man to shore after emergency medical services arrived.
The second rescue, involving the mv. San D, took place July 14. Pilot Nick Verdugo and deckhand Darius Thomas noticed a 12-foot aluminum jon boat carrying a family of four near Pinto Island, Mobile, Ala. Verdugo saw the boat turn upriver near the container terminal. When it was swamped due to heavy chop in the river, he sounded the general alarm, notified his deckhand and then radioed the mv. Safety Star of American Commerical Barge Line, which was nearby.
Verduvo then fired up the engines and then headed to assist the family in the water. Thomas tossed a life ring to the people in the water and successfully rescued two adults and two children under the age of 5. Additionally, they were able to retrieve the swamped jon boat. The family was safely transferred to the Safety Star, which had dry clothes and towels available, so that they could dry off and warm up.
Distinguished Service Award
Following lunch, event co-chair Merritt Lane introduced Timme to receive his award.
Timme retired with more than 32 years of experience in the Coast Guard, including more than a decade directly serving the mariners and industry of the Gulf of Mexico and inland rivers. His career included commands of inland river units and the Eighth Coast Guard District, as well as being a deputy incident commander for the Deepwater Horizon oil spill response.
As the assistant commandant for prevention policy overseeing the development of national policy, standards and programs for the Marine Transportation System, he was “a consistent advocate for smart public policies,” according to SCI’s event program.
He continues to work with stakeholders across the industry through Timme Maritime Consulting.
“Many of us in this room know Adm. Timme quite well and recognize what a sincere and committed individual he has been throughout his career,” Lane said. “I think we can all agree that what sets Rich apart is his selflessness, humility, honesty and above all, dedication to the service of others.”
Throughout his career he continuously focused on marine safety, security and environmental stewardship, Lane said, adding that made his mark on many of those in the industry by being “a thoughtful, considerate partner.”
In accepting the award, Timme said it was an honor to serve those in the industry.
“The mariners on our rivers and on our coasts choose not a career but a way of life, and it’s not an easy one,” he said.
Timme said he believes the strength of his career has been based on his relationships with others and ability to talk to people in a way that’s relatable as much as any knowledge he gained along the way. Following his retirement from the Coast Guard, he said, it has been comforting that those relationships he worked so hard on have continued and that he is glad to now find himself surrounded by these people who are partners and professionals.
River Legend Award
Todd Clower, CEO of Harbor Towing & Fleeting, presented the River Legend Award to his father, Jerry.
Jerry Clower said the award should really go to his father, whom he called a true pioneer of the industry in the 1930s. He described his father as a farm boy born in Crystal Springs, Miss., who went to New Orleans for work and met his mother when they both worked for Federal Barge Lines. His father then worked for Dixie Barge Lines before forming Harbor Towing & Fleeting, which is based in New Orleans and now operates four inland towboats and a barge fleeting area in the Port New Orleans area known as Star Fleet.
Jerry Clower said his father made sure he got his start in the industry early.
“I was 12 years old,” he said. “I was a deckhand one summer. That was an interesting experience.”
By 15, he said, he was “coming up in the world” and had become a tankerman.
He later attended Louisiana State University and graduated with a degree in engineering. After LSU, he served his country in the Coast Guard Reserves. Clower worked for Woodward Wright and Union Carbide for a while as an adult, but his father called him back to work for the company in the 1980s to assist him in managing the company during some difficult years.
“I said this is not the right time to get into this,” he said he told his father. The elder Clower’s reply was succinct. “He said, ‘Yeah, you’re here.’”
Jerry Clower worked to rebuild the company over time. Then, in 2005, Hurricane Katrina hit.
“Everything got wiped out,” he said.
While the company headquarters was taken out, the company still had a couple of boats, so Clower went to work on them, he said, calling in his own son, Todd, to help.
“He came back primarily with a mission to build Star Fleet, and he did,” Clower said.
In some ways, he said, recovery from Hurricane Katrina built Harbor Fleeting & Towing into a stronger company.
“We didn’t have to retrofit and redo a lot of it because we did it from scratch, and we had it exactly how it needed to be when we opened the doors in 2010,” he said.
Not one to focus on the past, Clower said he is instead excited for the future, hoping that one day his 5-year-old grandson makes the fourth generation of the Clower family to run the company.
River Bell Award
John Eckstein of Marquette Transportation Company presented the River Bell Award to Adrian, saying, “He was actually my first mentor in the river business.”
Eckstein and Adrian are only a year apart in age, so he remembered Adrian from his high school days, when he was the drummer for a band called Ezra.
“Fortunately, Ezra didn’t work out,” he said.
When Eckstein came to work for Marquette, the company had been through some difficult times, but “I quickly realized Darin was one of the reasons Marquette was still alive,” Eckstein said.
Adrian moved with the company when it relocated to Paducah, Ky., and he has been with Marquette for 34 years now.
“He’s been on all the boards,” Eckstein said, noting Adrian’s service on the River Industry Executive Task Force, where he served as co-chair, a board member of the American Waterways Operators’ Midwest and Ohio Valley regions, the AWO executive committee, SCI’s River Bell Committee, Living Lands & Waters and others.
“But what he’s done behind the scenes, in my opinion, is more impressive,” he said.
He continued, “He’s done so much in his career to keep commerce moving on the inland waterways, whether it’s severe low water, floodwater, hurricanes, ice; you name it, he’s been in the middle of it, making sure to keep things moving, always with the safety of the mariner in front and foremost.”
The reason why is simple, he said.
“He cares about them, respects them, and in turn they respect him.”
Adrian said he has had many mentors in the industry and thanked them for his support and guidance, saying that what he has wanted is to pay it forward.
“I’ve had the privilege to work with some of the greatest,” he said.
In particular, he thanked his parents and also his wife, Lisa, whom he noted had moved with him to Paducah 33 years ago to the day, three weeks before Christmas and 7-1/2 months pregnant.
Adrian said he came to the river industry in 1986, fresh from work in the dairy industry in Wisconsin. He has seen many changes along the way, he said. He was a dispatcher when the company got its first fax machine on board a boat, he said.
However, he said, despite all the changes in technology and the improvements the company has been able to make, what has made Marquette successful are its mariners.
“I know there are a lot of people in this room who have a backpack and are ready to get on a boat at a moment’s notice,” he said.
He thanked them as well as the shoreside personnel who work hard behind the scenes before turning to those in the room.
“Thank you all for your roles in guiding this industry through changing times, market swings, 500-year droughts, 500-year floods, pandemics and so on,” he said. And so I stand here before you with a humble heart, filled with gratitude for all you wonderful friends, family, customers, coworkers, industry partners and especially the Seamen’s Church Institute. Thank you for your contributions to SCI on this special day and every day. Your continued support allows them to continue in their mission of providing our mariners with the ministry, education and advocacy that they so richly deserve.”
The Rev. Mark Nestlehutt, SCI’s president and executive director, thanked those who attended the awards luncheon.
“SCI extends its congratulations to all our River Bell award recipients,” he said. “Beyond honoring individual accomplishments, the River Bell Awards Luncheon also highlights the robust and committed support from the inland maritime community, and SCI is very grateful to our event committee and its co-chairs, as well as our sponsors, supporters and attendees for their unwavering dedication to those who work our nation’s waterways. We thank them for being an integral part of this extraordinary celebration of excellence.”
Caption for top photo: From left: Damon Judd, president and CEO of Marquette Transportation Company; River Bell Award recipient Darin Adrian, Marquette president-river division; John Eckstein, Marquette executive chairman; Merritt Lane, president and CEO of Canal Barge Company; and the Rev. Mark Nestlehutt, president and executive director of SCI. (Photo courtesy of Seamen’s Church Institute)
