Rouge: Pictured in Its Prime

12. Marine Operations

12 MARINE OPERATIONS The River Rouge Plant was located in 1917 on the banks of the Rouge River so that Henry Ford could bring his raw materials in by boat and ship his manufactured products out by boat. The dredging of the river channel and boat slip by the U.S. government made that possible. In addition to the manufacture of Eagle boats, Ford had in mind especially his tractors. It was rumored as early as October 1919 that he planned a steamship line to deliver tractors to Ireland. At the termination of the Eagle contract, Ford announced he would manufacture barges at the Rouge location, and in August 1921, he announced plans to run freight barges on the Erie Canal to carry products between Detroit and New York. In time, he would do all of these things. The first steam freighter is said to have docked at the Rouge in July 1923. About this same time, Ford was ordering two mammoth cargo carriers with which to supply his blast furnaces with iron ore from the Lake Superior region. These were the almost identical Henry Ford II and Benson Ford. To deliver manufactured goods worldwide, Ford was limited by the small dimensions of the St. Lawrence Seaway and the Erie Canal. To ply the Atlantic, he purchased two small ocean freighters, Oneida and Onondaga, which, by late 1924, were headed for southern Atlantic ports. A larger ocean vessel purchased in 1925 from the government was the East Indian, the pride of the Ford ocean fleet, which plied waters between New York and European, African, and Asian ports. The largest group of ships to enter the Rouge were the 199 “Lakers,” built at Great Lakes ports for Atlantic shipping during World War I and in 1925 part of the government’s “Moth Ball” fleet. These were purchased by Ford at various Atlantic seaports at scrap prices and hauled by tug to the Rouge for salvage. Very few were saved for use as vessels. A large amount of automobile freight was carried by canal barges between the Rouge and the East Coast seaports of Chester, Pennsylvania; Edgewater, New Jersey; Green Island, New York; and Norfolk, Virginia. The barges Chester and Edgewater were added to the fleet in 1931. They were at that time the largest cargo ships using the New York State Barge Canal. In 1937, the barges Green Island and Norfolk were added. These canal barges had retractable pilot houses, folding masts, and funnels that could be lowered to pass under bridges. In all, the Ford fleet headquartered at the Rouge reached a total of twenty-nine vessels — thirteen barges, four towing tugs, one harbor tug, four canal boats, five oceangoing ships, and two ore carriers. 83 84 Top: The engine room of the Henry Ford II. (833.41652) Bottom: The Henry Ford II in calm open water on the Great Lakes during October 1928. The ship carries a crew of thirty-four men including eight officers. (833.53159) 85 The East Indian never visited the Rouge but is shown here at Jacksonville, Florida, on February 6, 1935. Its 461-foot length is 200 feet too long to traverse the inland waterways. This 8200-ton ship was purchased by Ford in 1925 for $80,000 as a coal-fired steamer and converted to diesel power to provide a speed of 16.5 knots. Its purpose was to carry Ford freight to and from overseas ports. One load, for example, included 500 cars in wooden boxes together with 8000 engines, delivering them to dealers in Trieste, Barcelona, Copenhagen, and Antwerp. The East Indian, however, was one of the casualties of World War II. Chartered by the government, it was sunk by Nazi submarine U-181 on November 3, 1942, in the Indian Ocean, 300 miles from Capetown, South Africa. Of the crew, twenty-three went down with the ship, and fifty-one survived using a lifeboat and life rafts. (833.61999) Above: The Oneida, built by the Detroit Shipbuilding Company in 1920 and acquired by Henry Ford in 1923. At 261 feet in length, it is barely able to pass through the Canadian canals and locks, but by the fall of 1924, after hauling lumber on the Great Lakes, both the Oneida and a sister ship, the Onondaga, will be based on the Atlantic coast and ply waters between Jacksonville, New Orleans, Houston, and as far south as Buenos Aires...