On a moonlit night, a family and friends are seeing someone off returning on a late evening ferry to New Orleans, the “Big Easy”. The steam ferry “Thomas Pickles” is departing from the Canal Street Dock at the foot of Morgan St. in Algiers, Louisiana, bound for the Canal Street Terminal in New Orleans across the Mississippi River. The Canal Street Ferry, also known as the Algiers Ferry service, is still in operation today and has been in regular service since 1827.
The Thomas Pickles was a center-wheel ferry constructed in 1893 at the Howard Shipyard & Dock Co. in Jeffersonville, Indiana, and could carry up to 250 passengers. The vessel featured twin hulls and was owned by the Union Ferry Boat Co. of New Orleans. It was named for the head of the New Orleans-Algiers Ferry Operations, and served the harbor and other rivers throughout its 72-year life until destroyed by hurricane Betsy in 1965. The wreck of the Pickles currently lies at the bottom of the Mississippi River.
In the distance, one of the illuminated steamboats docked along the levee is the “Chalmette”, named for a New Orleans suburb, which operated as a packet boat on the lower Mississippi until it sank in 1904 about 60 miles south of Natchez.
The steeple of the First Presbyterian Church on Lafayette Square can be seen between the ferry stacks behind the Chalmette. It was constructed in 1819 and unfortunately destroyed by the great hurricane of 1915, a category 4 storm that killed 275 people.
On a moonlit night, a family and friends are seeing someone off returning on a late evening ferry to New Orleans, the “Big Easy”. The steam ferry “Thomas Pickles” is departing from the Canal Street Dock at the foot of Morgan St. in Algiers, Louisiana, bound for the Canal Street Terminal in New Orleans across the Mississippi River. The Canal Street Ferry, also known as the Algiers Ferry service, is still in operation today and has been in regular service since 1827.
The Thomas Pickles was a center-wheel ferry constructed in 1893 at the Howard Shipyard & Dock Co. in Jeffersonville, Indiana, and could carry up to 250 passengers. The vessel featured twin hulls and was owned by the Union Ferry Boat Co. of New Orleans. It was named for the head of the New Orleans-Algiers Ferry Operations, and served the harbor and other rivers throughout its 72-year life until destroyed by hurricane Betsy in 1965. The wreck of the Pickles currently lies at the bottom of the Mississippi River.
In the distance, one of the illuminated steamboats docked along the levee is the “Chalmette”, named for a New Orleans suburb, which operated as a packet boat on the lower Mississippi until it sank in 1904 about 60 miles south of Natchez.
The steeple of the First Presbyterian Church on Lafayette Square can be seen between the ferry stacks behind the Chalmette. It was constructed in 1819 and unfortunately destroyed by the great hurricane of 1915, a category 4 storm that killed 275 people.