If this blog had more readers, I would engage them in a couple of contests, such as Most Beautiful Ohio River Bridge Face-off. Round 1, Roebling vs. Ironton-Russell; Huntington East End vs. Natcher; Sciotoville Railroad vs. Wheeling Suspension; U.S. Grant vs. Blennerhassett Island.
Or a Most Photogenic Towboat: O. Nelson Jones vs. Linda Reed; Charleston vs. Lelia C. Shearer; Detroit vs. Lee Synnott; R. Clayton McWhorter vs. Fred Way.
Hmm. On the boats, I'd probably have to add four more to keep some people happy: Buckeye State, J.S. Lewis, Bridgett Cauley and the Jackson H. Randolph, perhaps. Four boats would have to get first round byes, and now that I think about it, maybe one of these would survive the first round.
As far as the bridges go, it's been so long since I've been to the upper and lower ends of the river that I'm probably forgetting a few that should be on here.
Or I would ask all three of my readers for their thoughts on which cities and/or small towns look best from the river, day and night divisions.
The thing about contests is they reveal as much about the biases of the organizers and the judges as they do about the people or things being judged.
Maybe I'll put all this in the back of my mind for a series later. Any reasonable thoughts out there are welcome. Or if you want to go ahead and share your thoughts on who would win any of these face-offs, I'm open.
7 comments:
Certainly not the most beautiful, but one of the river's bridges that I find interesting is the behemouth railroad bridge at Sciotoville, OH. You can't really see it from the KY side (US Rt 23) but you pass under it on the OH side (US Rt 52) and the steel beams are enormous! That bridge held a number of engineering records for a long time.
If it was my list, I'd have lots more Dravo power mixed in: Rita Barta, Northern, Southern, Eugenie P. Jones, Arkwright & Mathies, and I can't leave out the Humphrey. If I HAD to narrow it down to one, it would probably be the Semet...shame it is on the bottom below Maysville just rotting away.
Or I could throw in the old Valvoline. Lesta K, Allied-Ashland/Aetna Louisville, Tri-State, Eastern ...
And there's one more that I haven't seen on the river in years. I'm going to devote a separate entry with three or four pictures from the 1980s.
It seems such a face-off or tournament would need to have at least two divisisons: contemporary, for boats on the river today, and classic, for boats that are no longer with us.
In the contemporary division, I would have to add the Aliquippa and similar boats.
It is hard to beat the old SOLVAY, with the gold pilothouse, stack and stern trim. An absolute classic.
I seem to remember the Solvay from my childhood, if that was the same boat. The paint scheme and overall appearance made it stick in my mind for a long, long time.
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