Four Thousand Miles of Transportation Engineering

The below story originally appeared in two parts, published in Transportation Engineer in 1977. This shipment supported the original construction of the Fermi II Nuclear Plant in Newport, MI. The Port of Monroe was the import location for these original components and has sourced additional components to support the plant since.

Part 1: Floating over Britain’s Bridges

The challenge for Robert Wynn and Sons Limited: Several ”uncrossable” bridges stood between the biggest generator ever made in Britain and Mammoet Shipping’s HAPPY RIDER, which was to transport it to America

known as Andy Mylenek’s baby or ”GEC’s big baby,” it is the largest generator ever manufactured in Great Britain. Detroit Edison Company ordered it for their Enrico Fermi nuclear plant near Monroe, Michigan.

Edison sent Anderson R. Mylenek of their purchasing department to Stafford, England to work with the manufacturer, GEC Turbine Generator Limited during the 1215-megawatt baby gestation.

Birth records list its sex as AC and its weight as over 600 tons. (Tons mentioned in this article are short tons) it could be shipped in four pieces, the heaviest item, the stator frame, weighs 348 ½ tons. The rotor, which fits inside the stator, weighs 177 tons. At each end of the stator are 42 ½ ton cooler enclosures containing pipes through which cold water flows, cooling hydrogen gas, which in turn, cools many of the working parts through the generator.

GEC contracted with Robert Wynn and Sons Limited, whose main office is in Newport, Wales, to move all four components from Stafford to Manchester, the English inland seaport sixty-five miles north of Stafford. The rotor and cool enclosures presented little challenge to Wynns, who since 1863 have made “impossible” moves in many parts of the world.

But the stator presented a worthy challenge. It would be the heaviest load ever moved over a substantial distance in great Britan. Measuring 36 feet 6 inches long, 13 feet 3 inches high and 16 feet wide, the stator would wipe out fixed obstacles along the railroad right of way between Stafford and Manchester. Wynns must use the highway, but the highway contains 19 small uncrossable bridges. Fortunately, wynns has an ideal bridgecrossing transporter, a 392-ton capacity, 14-axle, 112-wheel double swan trailer made by Nicolas industries of Auxerre, France, famous for their minimum dead-weight transporters. Even so, many of the bridges might not stand the stress that would be caused, first by the Nicolas’s forward bogie and then by its aft bogie. It might be impossible to “wynn” the battle of the bridges.

Nevertheless, an overhead crane in the GEC plant loaded the stator onto timbers placed between the steel beams of the Nicolas’s side-beam bed. The bed was suspended between the Nicolas’s forward and aft bogies. Two 10-wheel tractors, one fore and one aft, powered the trailer and stator toward the first bridge- the weakest one of all- just a tenth of a mile away.

The rig stopped just short of the bridge. The rear tractor uncoupled and backed away- an apparent gesture of admitted defeat- but actually the gathering crowd was about to see something new in transportation engineering.

A large enclosed truck called a blower vehicle took the place of the rear tractor. Inside the vehicle four air compressors forced air through ducts that protruded over the vehicles cab and connected with similar ducts on the trailer’s rear bogie. The trailer’s ducts angled downward into an air chamber under the stator between the bed’s vertically broadside beams.

The top of the chamber was formed by a rectangular tarpaulin-like fabric that hung horizontally under the stator like a safety net under a trapeze artist. Beneath the rectangular fabric, a weighted flexible skirt hung vertically below all four sides of the side-beam bed on which the stator rested. The bottom of the chamber was the pavement itself. When the compressed air reached the chamber, the rectangular fabric puffed up like an air supported roof, and minute dust storms appeared on the pavement around the outer edge of the flexible skirt.

The onlookers heard the rush of air and saw the dust storms. They were familiar with the hovercrafts that speed across the English Channel, floating not on water but on air. They realized that the same principle – blower and flexible skirt – was forming an air cushion under the stator. And they understood that the cushion would spread the weight of the load over a wide area, lessening the weight that would bear down on the bridge at any one time. (the bridge, the forward bogie, the side-beam and the rear bogie are each about the same length.) word passed among the onlookers that this application of an air cushion is called Hoverlift, that it was provided by the British government’s CEGB (Central Electricity Generating Board) and that the British Hovercraft Corporation was operating it for CEGB (???????)

As the crowd watched the dust storms, it saw the skirt’s skid plates start to slide along the pavement. The forward bogie’s 56 tires rolled across the bridge. The skirt’s skid plates slid across. The rear bogie’s 56 tires rolled across.

It was a rolling, sliding success. The rear tractor replaced the blower vehicle. The skirt’s built-in hydraulic system lifted the skirt from the pavement and stowed it in pleats under the bed. The bridge crossing – including switching and reswitching the rear tractor and blower vehicle – had taken 15 minutes.

Nor did the rig have any problems on the open road or on the remaining 18 bridges. Four days after leaving the plant, it rolled onto Manchester’s Pomona docks.

The rotor and cooler enclosures, aboard other Wynns transporters, easily made the trip to Manchester.

GEC had contracted with Mammoet Shipping Company of Amsterdam, Holland, to carry the generator from Manchester, England, to Monroe, Michigan, USA. Mammoet sent their newest heavy-equipment motorship, the Happy Rider, to Manchester. It has a stern ramp for roll-on/roll-off operations, but the water at Pomona Docks is not deep enough to allow it to ballast down to level its ramp with the dock.

However, the Happy Rider has two derricks, one on the starboard side and one centerlined just aft of the ship’s superstructure. Working together, they might lift the stator aboard – provided the lift didn’t cause the ship to exceed an allowed 10-degree list. As the derricks lifted the stator over the port side, the Happy Rider listed 9.8 degrees.

To facilitate loading, the happy rider has sectional, removable decks aft of its superstructure. Its crew had placed the rotor on the starboard side of the deck immediately below the roll-on/roll-off deck. Then they had replaced the portion of the ro/ro deck over the rotor. They placed the stator and cooler enclosures on the ro/ro deck, the stator on the port side and the cooler enclosures on the starboard side. Then they replaced the weather (main) deck to protect the stator and cooler enclosures.

After the four components were secured, the Happy Rider cast off and serenely sailed out the Manchester Ship Canal – like the last scene of a travelogue.

But it was not the last scene of the story. The Happy Rider must sail across the Atlantic and through the St. Lawrence Seaway to the Port of Monroe. Then, Laramie, Inc., of Detroit would write the last, exciting chapter. This story will be carried in a future issue.

Part II: Six miles – As the Crow Flies

If you read Part I, “Floating over Britain’s bridges,” in the July issue of TRANSPORTATION ENGINEER, you will recall that we left the biggest generator ever made in Great Britain as it was leaving England. It was the sole cargo of Mammoet Shipping Company’s heavy-equipment motorship, the Happy Rider, which was proceeding out the Manchester ship canal toward the Atlantic Ocean.

Ship and generator travelled across the Atlantic and through the St. Lawrence Seaway to Monroe, Michigan, on the western shore of Lake Erie. Monroe is the closest deepwater port to the generator’s destination, the $914-million Enrico Fermi Unit No. 2 nuclear plant, scheduled for completion in 1980. The plant is the joint venture of the Detroit Edison Company, which has an 80% interest, and two Michigan cooperatives.

When the Happy Rider’s crew secured their ship to the Port of Monroe’s wharf, the generator’s four components were only six miles – as the crow flies – from the Fermi plant. But it would take a lot of crows to fly the 348-½ ton stator. Or the 177-ton rotor. Or even the two endpieces, the 42 ½-ton cooler enclosures. Furthermore, both the stator and the rotor were too heavy to be hauled over local roads. And the water route to the plant was much too shallow for the ship’s 14-plus-foot draft.

But a viable transporting plan had evolved long before the happy rider docked at Monroe. The manufacturer, GEC Turbine Generators Limited (better known as English Electric) of Stafford, England had asked Detroit’s Laramie, Inc., a member of the heavy specialized carriers conference, to supply men, machines, and know-how. Don Laramie, president, and Art Ryke, transportation manager, led the Laramie team which for four months prior to the ship’s arrival planned how their company could best perform its part of the job. The Laramie team’s primary goal was safety.

The Happy Rider’s weather deck (main deck) and its ro/ro (roll-on/roll-off) deck are sectional and removable. The stator and the two cooler enclosures were secured on the ro/ro deck, which is the first deck below the weather deck. The rotor was secured on the third deck. To facilitate unloading, the crew had removed the weather deck as they neared Monroe. The ship has two derricks, one centerlined just aft of the superstructure and facing the stern, the other at the starboard quarter and facing the port side. The centerlined derrick off-loaded the cooler enclosures. They were hauled to the Fermi plant on two of Laramie’s 50-ton Talbert lowboys by two of their R-700 Mack tractors. But the stator remained on the ro/ro deck – moving it would involve the ro/ro capabilities.

Aided by her twin screws and her bow thruster, the Happy Rider swung her bow 90 degrees and pressed her stern flat against the wharf. By slowly backing down on both engines, she maintained this backward-perpendicular-to-shore position. Port and starboard lines extending obliquely from amidships further steadied her as she lowered her stern ramp onto the wharf. Because of the ramp’s thickness it would be impossible to run a vehicle onto it from the wharf. Therefore four ironwood mats, four feet wide by 16 feet long, were placed side by side longitudinally (and supported with cribbing) to make a gradual grade from the wharf to the ramp’s rolling surface.

Ray Palarchio, one of Laramie’s most skilled drivers, peered into his side-view mirror at the image of the ramp toward which his rig’s 74 wheels were backing. The first 32 wheels to go up the ramp belong to Laramie’s 200-ton capacity Talbert dolly. The next 32 belong to their 250-ton-capacity Talbert hydraulic gooseneck trailer. The last 10 belong to a Mack DM-800 tractor that Mack Truck Inc. modified for Laramie to haul another rig, their famous 4100M, a 4100W Manitowoc upper works on a Goldhofer THP 7 transport. Powered by a 335 Cummins, the Mack has five reverses and is capable of 52 forward gear combinations. Palarchio stopped the rig just before the dolly reached the stator – leaving just enough room in front of the tractor to allow the ship to raise its ramp.

When the ramp was up, the ship once again docked with its port side to the wharf. Laramie’s 60-ton Manitowoc truck crane lifted material from the wharf to a working crew on the ro/ro deck to help the men prepare the rig to receive the stator. The men guided blocking lengthwise onto the aft portion of the trailer and onto the entire dolly. Then they guided steel beams crossways onto the blocking. Finally, they placed two-inch ironwood softeners on top of the steel beams.

The happy rider’s two derricks lifted the stator from ironwood blocking that had acted as a buffer between the ro/ro deck and stator. The blocking was removed and Palarchio backed the rig until the softeners on the steel beams were directly under the support pads. The derricks lowered the stator onto the trailer and dolly. After being lashed to the rig, the stator was ready for the road.

The “road” was a flat deck cargo barge supplied by the American Shipbuilding Company of Chicago, Illinois. It waited just aft of the stern ramp. Mud mats covered the portion of its deck on which the rig and stator would rest.

The happy rider’s ramp lowered onto the barge’s deck, but the end of the lowered ramp was about 20 feet short of the portion of the deck containing the mud mats. A bridge consisting of five longitudinal steel sheets reinforced with I-beams spanned the gap from the end of the ramp to the mats. As a final precaution before moving the rig and stator, cribbing was placed under the bridge.

Palarchio inched the rig forward. The ship’s push-button-operated ballasting pumps started to shift water from the aft compartments to the forward compartments. A winch on the ship’s superstructure grudgingly played out a taut safety line that was secured to the back of the barely moving dolly. The rig crept over the ramp, over the bridge, and on to the mud mats. Two portable pumps on the barge’s deck pumped water out of the barge’s hull and shot it over the side. The safety cable was removed from the dolly. The rig and stator had been moving so slowly that it was difficult to tell they had stopped. Palarchio earned half a day’s wages during his ship to barge ride. Cables and turnbuckles lashed the dolly, the trailer, and the stator itself to the barge’s cleats and bitts. Hydraulic jacks jammed between the barge’s deck and the understructures of the trailer and dolly took the weight off the tires, and removed the danger of the stator rocking on the rig in case Lake Erie should act eerily. Two tugboats undocked the barge and headed her into the river raisin. The J. R. Sprankle, owned by Martran Company of Flat Rock, Michigan, towed. The West Wind, owned by Shepard Marine Construction Company of Mt. Clemens, Michigan, pushed, as the armada traveled two miles out the river to Lake Erie. The tugs maintained the same positions in the lake as they moved through eight miles of open water. Lake Erie behaved beautifully.

Just before they reached a dredged open-water channel about 1,500 yards from the Fermi slip, the Sprankle’s towline was cast off from the barge, and the barge was turned completely around. The Sprankle stood by while the West Wind pushed the backwards facing barge through the channel and into the slip. The tugs’ safety-conscious captains had taken more than three hours to make the trip.

Much of the silt had been dredged from the slip, and two of the Happy Rider’s deck sections had been lowered until they rested flat on the slip’s bottom. Protective ironwood mats (heavy enough to sink) had been lowered onto the deck sections.

As the two portable pumps flooded the barge’s aft compartments, it became apparent why the barge had been backed into the slip. The aft portion of the barge’s bottom – flatter than the bow portion of her bottom – sank until it rested securely on the flat ironwood mats that covered the sunken deck sections.

The same bridge over which the rig had rolled from the ship’s ramp to the barge’s mud mats was placed from the barge’s stern onto the shore.

Palarchio effortlessly backed his heavily laden rig onto the shore. He turned it around and drove it three quarters of a mile to the Fermi’s turbine room where a 425-ton P&H overhead crane placed the rig’s well-traveled load onto temporary cribbing. Palarchio maneuvered the empty rig back onto the barge, which then returned to the happy rider. The ro/ro deck sections over the rotor had been removed. The ship was turned 180 degrees and its starboard side was moored to the wharf. The tug nudged the barge against the ship’s port (unloading) side. The ship’s derricks lifted the rotor horizontally through the hole in the ro/ro deck, swung it over the barge and lowered it directly onto the trailer and dolly. From that point on, the rotor’s trip to Fermi’s turbine room was almost identical to the stator’s.

Don Laramie awarded the entire operation his highest compliment. “It was,” he said, “spectacularly uneventful.”

We Know Our Ships

One of the essential pieces of literature here at the Port of Monroe is Know Your Ships. Over the years, KYS has become synonymous with the Great Lakes shipping industry. Know Your Ships was founded in 1959 by Thomas Manse at Sault Ste. Marie. It began as a small staple-bound publication with 44 pages that sold for 50 cents. With the help of advertisers and industry support, Know Your Ships has grown to 200 color pages. Today, Roger LeLievre continues Tom’s legacy by speaking at libraries, historical societies, and conventions about Know Your Ships and its contribution to the Great Lakes maritime community.

The book continues to be a resource for anyone interested in learning basic information about the vessels on the Great Lakes. It has changed lives and kickstarted careers in the maritime industry. Every year, photographers from all over the lakes contribute their sensational images to Know Your Ships, which helps the book share to its readers and fans the best of what the Great Lakes shipping industry has to offer.

After looking through a copy of Know Your Ships, one will understand what cargoes the ships on the Great Lakes carry, what a master salute is, and how to identify ships based on their smokestack markings. It provides statistics on all the American and Canadian-flagged ships, as well as the many different saltwater ships that visit the Great Lakes during the shipping season.

For the second straight season, we are proud to sponsor an exclusive “Port of Monroe” cover of Know Your Ships. On the front cover is Interlake’s motor vessel Mark W. Barker inbound on the River Raisin passing the Paul R. Tregurtha unloading at the DTE Monroe Power Plant. On the back cover is the Great Lakes Towing Tug Georgia docked with the Mark W. Barker using the Port’s turning basin in the background. Both of these images were captured by our Port Director Paul C. LaMarre III.

It is important for us to support Know Your Ships as it is the premier source for information about Great Lakes vessels. We frequently use it to reference vessel dimensions of the ships that call on the Port and also as a tool to educate those unfamiliar with our industry. Copies of Know Your Ships can be found all along the shores of the Great Lakes in bookstores. You can also order your own copy online at www.knowyourships.com.

As each of us stands upon our collective docks awaiting the first ships of yet another season on the Great Lakes St Lawrence Seaway System, we must look within ourselves to see our way forward.

On June 26^th, 1959, President Dwight D. Eisenhower, so aptly stated that “this waterway, linking the oceans of the world with the Great Lakes of the American continent, is the culmination of the dreams of thousands of individuals on both sides of our common Canadian-United States border.” It is with that notion in mind that we must once again acquaint ourselves with the passion that sets our collective vessel in motion.

The Great Lakes St Lawrence Seaway system is not defined by any one cargo, vessel or voyage but rather by a diverse and dynamic culture of individuals from every corner of the Lakes themselves. “Our system” is one which places people before profit, consistency before competition, and pride before politics. In do so, we continue to fortify a cultural enigma of resolve, resilience, and reliability that is Great Lakes St Lawrence Seaway Shipping.

With that, it is my great honor to serve our system as a mariner, Port Director, and President of the American Great Lakes Ports Association (AGLPA). While any of our respective roles are for but an instant in the annals of Great Lakes shipping, we can only hope to leave our mark in a way that inspires our fellow leaders, associates, customers, and the public we serve.

For me, having been immersed in our industry since birth, the Great Lakes represent a way of life. They define every aspect of my personal and professional being. My family has experienced our industry’s finest hours and most challenging moments. I have battled wind and wave in raging storms and plied the majestically calm waters of the mighty inland seas. I have stood before the challenge of barren waterfront facilities and reveled in the many milestones of a revived seaport. Inevitably, my inspiration through this journey, ashore and at sea, has been and will always be, the people who stand next to me.

Nowhere in the world is there another system of marine highways that is so deeply engrained within the fabric of the communities which surround it. Whenever one asks where we live, work, and recreate our most common answer is the “Great Lakes.” Not a particular neighborhood, street, city or state but rather the region as a whole. Why? Because we, as inspired people, are proud of where we are from and seek to share our overflowing abundance of industrial and ecological marvels for the good of our nations (U.S. & Canada).

While the Great Lakes St Lawrence Seaway system is not without its challenges, it is our response to those challenges which has hardened our ironclad identity. We must think of ourselves as one Great Lakes Port fighting to ensure that freight flows through our waterways because our system is the most environmentally conscious, efficient, and economical means of reaching the industrial heartland of America. We must tell our story in a purely positive manner that is one rivaled by our mutual admiration for each other’s efforts. We must diversify our cargoes while ensuring that commerce flows to its most logical destination despite the century old supply chains of our coastal competitors.

In closing, I am humbly appreciative of the opportunity to share what may be just a glimpse into the depths of my motivation and would like to express my sincerest thanks to my friend and our Seaway Administrator, Adam Tindall-Schlicht whose passion for our industry and persona of positivity can serve as an inspiration to all of us.

May the 2023 shipping season be filled with passion, inspiration and prosperity.

“Keep On Tuggin’”

Capt. Paul C. LaMarre III

This was originally published in the Winter 2023 edition of the Seaway Compass published by the Great Lakes St. Lawrence Seaway Development Corporation.

At the Port of Monroe, the most difficult part of our year is determining when the old shipping season ends and the new one begins. Other ports around the Great Lakes are closed for the winter, as are the Soo Locks and St. Lawrence Seaway, but the Port of Monroe has remained open.

Last week, the tanker Iver Bright called on our Turning Basin dock to discharge liquid asphalt. The tanker was assisted to and from the berth by the tug Georgia. The Georgia, one of many tugs operated by the Great Lakes Towing Company, provides ship assistance and icebreaking services so that vessels can safely call on the Port in the winter. There hasn’t been any ice to contend with in the River Raisin lately, but we’ve certainly had our share of winter weather.

This week, the Harvest Spirit made its first visit of the season, calling on our riverfront dock with a load of steel coils. The Harvest Spirit was built in 2012 at the Sefine Shipyard in Altinova, Turkey as the Zealand Juliana, and visited the Great Lakes a handful of times during its career on saltwater. Its name was shortened to Juliana in 2015 and McKeil purchased the vessel in 2020.

It is just over 500 feet long, 73 feet 10 inches wide, and 35 feet 5 inches deep. As its name suggests, the Harvest Spirit is primarily used to carry grain. These trips typically begin in Thunder Bay, ON and end at Windsor, ON. From Windsor, it is a quick trip across Lake Erie to Nanticoke, ON. where the ship’s steel coil cargoes originate from.

The steel is manufactured by Stelco and staged for shipment by vessel. The Harvest Spirit’s three deck-mounted cranes make it the perfect vessel to haul coiled steel. The Nanticoke-Monroe route is a year-round transportation solution for regional manufacturers, as it is much more efficient to move 500 or more coils by water than by truck or rail. Once the coils are offloaded at Monroe, the Port’s terminal operator DRM Terminal Services ensure that coils are efficiently loaded for last-mile delivery to customers.

After delivering coils to Monroe, the Harvest Spirit assumes its regular Thunder Bay-Windsor trade route. Since joining the McKeil fleet, the Harvest Spirit has become one of the most frequent callers to the Port of Monroe. It’s also one of the busiest ships on the Great Lakes, operating at a time while other cargo vessels are still wintering. That will change in the coming weeks, as crews report back to fit-out vessels in advance of the new shipping season. In Monroe, that season has already begun.

A DECADE OF DEVELOPMENT AT THE PORT OF MONROE FOR PAUL C. LAMARRE III

Anything you have read about the Port of Monroe, Michigan in the last decade would not be possible without the leadership of Paul C. LaMarre III.

Paul is celebrating 10 years at the helm of the Port this season, and the rebirth of Monroe as a seaport is just one of many reclamation projects that he has conducted over the years.

His most notable work is saving the 1911-built freighter Col. James M. Schoonmaker, which is now the centerpiece at the growing National Museum of the Great Lakes. Paul became director of the scrapyard-bound museum ship in 2007 when it was known as the Willis B. Boyer and guided the ship through a massive restoration.

The ship was moved from its old berth in Toledo to its present dock in 2011. The process included a return to the ship’s original name and livery of the Shenango Furnace Company.

Completing such a monumental task would leave some people content, but not Paul. The retired Great Lakes Towing Company tug Ohio was restored in 2019 and dedicated to the museum in a joint ceremony with the new tug Ohio, christened by Paul’s wife, Julie.

When the 100-plus-year-old steamer St. Marys Challenger was converted to a barge at Sturgeon Bay in 2013, the pilothouse was removed and transported to Toledo on the deck of the thousand-footer Paul R. Tregurtha – an unconventional move orchestrated by Paul. The pilothouse was offloaded at Midwest Terminals and remained there until December 2021 when the final move to the museum was made. It was fitting then, that the St. Marys Challenger was also in Toledo that day, holding up a piece of her own heritage.

The projects don’t stop there- the pilothouse of the old tug Wm. A. Whitney is in Paul’s backyard, being restored. You can see the spotlight he installed shine all the way to Detroit River Light after dark.

There’s still room in his yard for more. Close friend Roger LeLievre, publisher of the book Know Your Ships, theorizes that with Paul’s unrelenting drive, he could get the Queen Mary in his backyard if he said he would.

Once complete, these restoration projects serve as relics to the past of the Great Lakes, honoring the heritage and history of the inland seas. In the present day, they serve an additional purpose: Making people believe.

Paul sketched the original layout for the National Museum of the Great Lakes on a napkin, when the future of the Schoonmaker, then-Boyer was in doubt. Restoring the ship and establishing it as the anchor for a larger museum development made people believers.

It was Paul’s passion for restoring the heritage of the Great Lakes that put him on the radar of other ports. He had given a number of presentations about Great Lakes history and the Schoonmaker at industry events, and the Monroe Port Commission took notice.

Paul took a rusting museum ship and established it as the unquestionable anchor of a larger development on Toledo’s waterfront, using his knowledge and passion of the industry to sell people on his vision.

The Port of Monroe, established in 1932, had been dormant for decades. Past eras of leadership left behind legacies of feasibility studies and advertising promotions that led to no cargo. The fit was obvious. When the commission decided to rebuild the port, they quickly determined that a director was needed to shape Monroe’s future, and Paul became the obvious candidate.

He became Port Director in 2012, at a port with no activity, outdated infrastructure, and a waterfront that had no indication of ever being used for port operations. It was a daunting task, but Paul set to work on identifying cargo in Monroe’s backyard that could be moved through the Port. That focus led to a partnership with DTE to manage synthetic gypsum produced from the Monroe Power Plant in 2014, which remains a foundational cargo at the Port.

From there, Paul combined his passion for the Great Lakes shipping industry with the need for speed he acquired first in his days flying F/A-18s in the Navy and later racing hydroplanes, and rapidly awakened the once-sleepy Port.

Monroe has notched six Pacesetter awards in Paul’s tenure as director, consistently celebrating new cargo evolutions and welcoming new ships. The Port has focused on niche cargo moves unique from traditional cargoes carried on the lakes, and welcomed several ships on their maiden trip into the Great Lakes/St. Lawrence Seaway System.

In addition to earning an unlimited deck officer’s license, Paul is now working to attain a Masters of Towing license, which will give him more opportunities on the water. He’s also becoming an accomplished marine artist- just like his father, Paul C. LaMarre Sr.

Development is not limited to ships and ports, either. Paul has always taken a relationships-first approach to everything and is actively helping chart the course for the next generation of maritime leadership, whether that’s on the docks or on the boats. He’ll always lend an ear to anyone in the maritime industry looking for support.

Paul has preserved each and every activity the Port has undertaken in photos. Documenting everything shows the community how the Port has grown and highlights the Monroe County residents that work at the Port.

However, one of the most inspirational photos taken at the Port since Paul’s arrival doesn’t include a ship or a cargo. It’s a day-one snapshot showing an inactive port with overgrown trees as the only tenant. It helps remind everyone of where we came from.

Now, where can we go? The future is unwritten, but when it is, Paul C. LaMarre will be the one holding the pen.

Written by Samuel Hankinson

This article originally appeared in Seaway Review