• Thursday-What'sUP November 20 - 10:08 pm

Back in the beginning of October, we featured a couple of photos by Rod Burdick, from this same Marquette Harbor dock. It's not the one you most commonly see in freighter photographs. The Kaye E. Barker is pulled up to the Lower Harbor Shiras Dock, unloading her cargo. I find these monstrous boats fascinating not only because of their size and the way they sail the Great Lakes, but how self contained they are with unloading equipment such as you can see in action in Rod's photos today. Just think how impressive the whole operation must be close-up, from right on board.

Always great to start the day with pictures from the home of my alma mater. Thanks Mary!

Great pictures today! I have enjoyed watching these lakers, since the first time I ever saw them....January of 1998, snowmobiling along the snowmobile trail past the Frazier Shipyards, Duluth Mn. on a day where the temp was -24 degrees, that was not the windchill.

Hi
I like seeing the classic style lakers, with the pilothouse in front.

They are magnificient! Kaye E. is a beauty! Thanks Rod.

My Grandfather used to run the old coal dock in Marquette (it is now a park I believe). We used to go and visit Grandpa and Grandma on the weekends and the first thing I always asked Grandpa "Is a boat at the dock"? If it was we always went down there to watch them unlaod. There used to be a huge gantry style crane with an arm that would lower over the boat and then a large bucket would drop down into the hold and empty the ship one bucket at a time. We were also able to go on the boats and meet the captains and some of the other people that were employed on the boats. This was quite a thrill for a young boy 7 - 8 years old.

Remember when I was a young boy growing up in Lake Linden watching the large freighters come into the coal docks at Torch Lake to be unloaded.
Misses those days.

Tom Dessellier

Scott D. If you watch the movie "Anatomy of a Murder" you will find a scene with Jimmy Stewart at a lunch counter eating hard boiled eggs and having a beer. The shot looks like a matt with the functioning coal dock and crane you spoke of, moving in the background.

What's even more remarkable about the Kaye E. Barker is that she has been sailing the lakes since 1952! She was born as the Edward B. Greene from 1952-85, then as the Benson Ford from 1985-89. She added 120' to her length in 1976 and became a self unloader in 1981. What's even more remarkable about these boats is that the Kaye Barker probably isn't anywhere near retirement age yet. There are several boats on the lakes that were built in the 1940's and before.

Wabbit, thanks I'll have to check that out.

The boats Kay E. Barker and James Barker are named after Mr. James Barker and his wife Kay E. Barker.

Kaye E. Barker Close up view from my neighborhood on the St. Clair River!

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Aft half view Kaye E. Barker

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