When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
Thanks for looking.Satisfaction guaranteed.Type:Standard Size, Undivided Back Offset Lithographic Printed Postcard by Averill No.1004Postal History: None.Caption: Hole in the Side of Steamer Elder showing how it settled on the rocks.Additional Information: The George W. Elder struck a submerged rock near Kalama, Washington, on January 22, 1905, sank in about 16 feet of water, and was later raised, repaired, and returned to service. Everyone aboard was rescued.
Built at Chester, Pennsylvania, in 1874 for the Oregon Steamship Company, the 250-foot passenger-and-freight steamer had spent decades on the Portland–San Francisco route. It was already famous as the vessel used for E. H. Harriman’s 1899 Alaska scientific expedition, carrying figures including John Muir and John Burroughs.
While leaving Portland downbound in January 1905, the Elder hit a rock in the Columbia off the Kalama area and settled on the river bottom. Although the vessel was abandoned as a total loss, its relatively shallow-water position made salvage possible.
Salvage and return
The insurance interests considered the ship not worth recovering. Salvage rights were acquired for $10,400 by “Lucky Jack” Graham, who spent roughly another $50,000 and more than a year raising the vessel. After repairs, he sold her in July 1906 to the North Pacific Steamship Company for a reported $160,000.
So, unlike a bar wreck or an offshore loss, the George W. Elder’s Columbia River “wreck” was a major but temporary grounding-and-sinking casualty rather than the end of the ship.
The rebuilt Elder remained in service until 1935. Notably, in 1907 she helped rescue survivors of her former Oregon Steamship Company running mate, the Columbia, after that vessel sank off the Mendocino coast following a collision with the steam schooner San Pedro.
The S.S. George W. Elder* was the expedition ship for Edward H. Harriman’s celebrated 1899 Harriman Alaska Expedition—not simply “George Elder,” though that shortened name was often used.
Harriman, the railroad magnate, chartered and lavishly refitted the George W. Elder for a two-month scientific cruise from Seattle to Alaska and the Bering Strait region. She departed Seattle on May 31, 1899, under Capt. Peter A. Doran, with Harriman’s family, guests, artists, crew, and a distinguished scientific party—about 126 people in all.
The route included the British Columbia Inside Passage, Glacier Bay, Sitka, Yakutat Bay, Prince William Sound, Kodiak, the Shumagins, Unalaska, the Pribilofs, Port Clarence, Cape Fox, Nome, and even Plover Bay in Siberia.
The voyage began as a family holiday but became an unusually ambitious, privately financed “floating university.” Its participants included John Muir, John Burroughs, C. Hart Merriam, William Trelease, Grove Karl Gilbert, and other leading naturalists, geologists, botanists, zoologists, and artists.
Its work produced major collections and observations, including new species and records, newly surveyed terrain such as Harriman Fiord, and a substantial photographic record. The investigators’ results were eventually published in the monumental 13-volume Harriman Alaska Expedition reports.
The George W. Elder had been built in 1874 by Roach & Sons at Chester, Pennsylvania, for the Oregon Steamship Company. Before the Harriman voyage she had Pacific Coast passenger-service experience; for 1899, Harriman had her outfitted to accommodate expedition life and scientific work. A surviving 1890 passenger-accommodations plan is held by San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park.
The University of Washington holds a particularly valuable visual record: the Harriman souvenir photograph albums, derived from more than 5,000 expedition photographs, including images by Edward S. Curtis and members of the party.
A useful starting point for primary visual material is the University of Washington’s Harriman Alaska Expedition of 1899 digital collection; for the vessel’s documentary trail, San Francisco Maritime’s George W. Elder accommodation-plan finding aid is especially worthwhile.
To the best of our ability we describe all defects, if any. If you have any questions please don\'t hesitate to email us.
