Explorer (sternwheeler)

{{Short description|Stern-wheel steamboat built 1858}} '''''Explorer''''' was a small, custom-made [[stern-wheel]] [[steamboat]] built for [[Second lieutenant]] [[Joseph Christmas Ives]] and used by him to carry the [[U. S. Army]] [[Corps of Topographical Engineers]] expedition to explore the [[Colorado River]] above [[Fort Yuma]] in 1858.<ref name=Lingenfelter>[http://www.ansac.az.gov/UserFiles/PDF/08182014/X028_FMIBurtellLingenfelterSteamboats/FMI%20Lingenfelter%20Steamboats/Steamboats%20on%20the%20Colorado%20River%201852-1916.pdf Richard E. Lingenfelter, Steamboats on the Colorado River, 1852-1916, University of Arizona Press, Tucson, 1978] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160118031332/http://www.ansac.az.gov/UserFiles/PDF/08182014/X028_FMIBurtellLingenfelterSteamboats/FMI%20Lingenfelter%20Steamboats/Steamboats%20on%20the%20Colorado%20River%201852-1916.pdf |date=January 18, 2016 }}</ref>{{rp|14,16–23,162}}

==History== After inquiring about the cost of chartering one of the Colorado River steamboats of [[George Alonzo Johnson]] and finding their rates too high, Lt. Ives ordered a steamboat built in 1857:

:"In the latter part of June I ordered of [[Neafie & Levy|Reaney, Neafie & Co.]], of [[Philadelphia]], an iron steamer, fifty feet long, to be built in sections, and the parts to be so arranged that they could be transported by railroad, as the shortness of time required that it should be sent to California, via the [[Isthmus of Panama]]. About the middle of August the boat was finished, tried upon the Delaware, and found satisfactory, subject to a few alterations only. It was then taken apart, sent to New York, and shipped on board of the California steamer which sailed on the 20th of August for [[Colón, Panama|Aspinwall]]. Mr. A. J. Carroll, of Philadelphia, who had engaged to accompany the expedition as steamboat engineer, went out in charge of the boat." <ref name=Ives>[https://books.google.com/books?id=1xIOAAAAQAAJ Joseph C. Ives, REPORT UPON THE COLORADO RIVER OF THE WEST, EXPLORED IN 1857 AND 1858 BY LIEUTENANT JOSEPH C. IVES, CORPS OF TOPOGRAPHICAL ENGINEERS, UNDER THE DIRECTION OP THE OFFICE OF EXPLORATIONS AND SURVEYS, A. A. HUMPHREYS, CAPTAIN TOPOGRAPHICAL ENGINEERS, IN CHARGE. BY ORDER OF THE SECRETARY OF WAR, GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE, WASHINGTON, 1861; PART I. GENERAL REPORT].</ref>{{rp|21}}

After being transported by the [[Panama Canal Railway#1855 Panama Railroad|Panama Railroad]] across the Isthmus to the Pacific Ocean, the ''Explorer'' was shipped again by steamship from [[Panama City]] up to San Francisco. From there expedition sailed with the parts of the steamboat on the deck of the [[schooner]] ''Monterey'' to the [[Colorado River Delta]] where it arrived November 30. There Ives oversaw its reassembly and launch on December 30, 1857, at [[Robinson's Landing]], [[Baja California]]. [[David C. Robinson]], owner of the landing and a pilot for George Alonzo Johnson, was made captain of the boat.<ref name=Lingenfelter/> {{rp|14,16–17,162}} <ref name=Ives/>{{rp|21–37}}

After Ives used the ''Explorer'' to ascend the Colorado River, he sent it back to Fort Yuma with Richardson. There it was put up for auction and sold to George A. Johnson for $1000. He had its engine and paddle wheel removed and used it for a barge to carry firewood to steamboat landings. In 1864 it broke free from it moorings at [[Pilot Knob (Imperial County, California)|Pilot Knob]] and was carried away 60 miles down river into the Delta where it sank in a slough, sometimes seen by passing steamers, until the river moved away from the location and it was hidden by the delta foliage and lost. Its wreck was found in 1929, by a survey party, in a dried up slough miles away from the new course of the river. A mere skeleton remained, its iron plates long ago removed to make [[Comal (cookware)|comales]] for baking tortillas.<ref name=Lingenfelter/>{{rp|23}}

==References== {{reflist}}

==External links== *[https://southwestexplorations.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/explorer.jpg Southwestexplorations.com: "Ives's steamboat, the ''Explorer'', commanded by Captain Robinson, steaming upriver past Chimney Peak, in 1858"] — ''from a lithograph by expedition artist [[Balduin Möllhausen]]''.

{{DEFAULTSORT:Explorer (sternwheeler)}} [[Category:Steamboats of the Colorado River]] [[Category:Stern-wheel steamboats of California]] [[Category:1857 ships]] [[Category:Ships built by Neafie and Levy]]