Onward (sternwheeler 1867)
Steamer Onward
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| History | |
|---|---|
| Owner: | People's Transportation Company |
| Route: | Tualatin River, Sucker (Oswego) Lake, Columbia and Lewis rivers |
| In service: | 1867 |
| Out of service: | 1879 |
| Identification: | U.S. #19274 |
| Fate: | Dismantled |
| General characteristics | |
| Class and type: | riverine all-purpose |
| Tonnage: | 155 gross tons; 81 registered tons |
| Length: | 98 ft (30 m) over hull (exclusive of fantail) |
| Beam: | 18 ft 4 in (5.59 m) over hull (exclusive of guards |
| Depth: | 4 ft 6 in (1.37 m) |
| Installed power: | twin steam engines, horizontally mounted, each with bore of 10.25 in (260 mm) and stroke of 4 ft (1.2 m). |
| Propulsion: | stern-wheel |
Onward was a stern-wheel driven steamboat that operated on the Tualatin River from 1867 to 1873, on Sucker Lake, now known as Oswego Lake, from 1873 to 1874, on the Cowlitz and Lewis rivers. This vessel should not be confused with the similar sternwheeler Onward built in 1858 at Canemah, Oregon and dismantled in 1865.
In June 1867, the People's Transportation Company was preparing to build a new steamer at Colfax, on the Tualatin River at about river mile 6, to run to Forest Grove.
The planned steamer would have a keel length of 95 feet, 18 feet beam, and 4 foot, 4 inch depth of hold. The new steamer was reported to be based on the design of the existing steamer Senator.
This appears to have been the steamer Onward reported in another source to have been built in 1867 at a place called Tualatin Landing by C.F. Kent and John Colman for Joseph Kellogg.
Onward was 98 ft (30 m) long, exclusive of the extension of the main deck over the stern, called the “fantail” on which the sternwheel was mounted. The beam (width) of the vessel was 18 ft 4 in (5.59 m). The depth of hold was 4.5 ft (1.4 m). The gross tonnage (a measure of volume and not weight) of the steamer was 155 gross tons and 81 registered tons. The official United States merchant vessel registry number was 19274.
Onward was driven by a stern-wheel, turned by twin steam engines, horizontally mounted, each with bore of 10.25 in (260 mm) and stroke of 4 ft (1.2 m).
Abigail Scott Duniway travelled on the Onward in August 1874, and described the operation of the vessel in her newspaper The New Northwest:
The little steamer is one of those which Dr. Haskell calls a “kick up behind,” being long and narrow, and consequently well suited to the navigation of the far-famed Slough of the Willamette and Columbia, and more especially to the narrow channels of the Lewis and Cowlitz rivers, where the captain draws a ‘bead’ on the current, and makes a hair trigger of the helm, and its, by dint of long practices, enabled to graze and barely pass the peeping and sunken snags which lie in wait to deceive the unwary on all our western water courses.
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