As lake currents usually were not strong enough to move logs along, they were assembled in bag booms that consisted of a series of pine logs of sufficient length to enclose the number of logs to be moved, chained end to end. Once enclosed, the boom was closed and made ready for warping. At this point the Alligator tug, equipped with a powerful winch on the drum of which ½ to 1 mile of
In one, the tug would engage her paddlewheels and steam down the lake in the direction the logs were to be moved. When a mile had been covered, the large warping anchor, attached to the steel cable wound on the drum, would be dropped to the bottom of the lake. If a shore-hold, in the form of a rock or tree, was available, the cable would be attached to it. The Alligator would then reverse her paddlewheels and back up to the boom, paying out the warping cable as she did so. On reaching the bag boom, the Alligator was securely hooked to it by chains. The paddlewheels were then disengaged and the drive for the winch from the engine put in gear. As the cable was wound onto the drum of the winch, the Alligator tug and her boom of logs were drawn to the warping anchor embedded in the lake bottom, or, to the shore-hold. The chains to the log boom were then unhooked, the paddlewheels put in gear, the warping anchor pulled aboard, and the whole process was repeated until the boom had been moved to the opposite end of the lake. Here the boom would be opened and the logs sent into the connecting stream, or flume, to the next lake. The Alligator would winch itself overland along the prepared portage into the next lake where the logs had been caught in a bag boom that awaited them. The whole process would be repeated in this way until the logs finally reached a main river, where they became part of a major log drive down river to the company’s sawmill.
The Gilmour & Company’s Alligator #18, Nipissing, is shown preparing to warp sawlogs held in the bag boom, circa 1895.
Courtesy of the Clarence F. Coons Collection.
This method of warping was also used where a bag boom of logs had to be rolled through a narrows, since fresh holds could be taken along the boom without disturbing the anchorage until the tug and the boom were winched up to it. Then the warping anchor would be raised and a fresh hold taken or another snub or shore-hold could be taken.
In the second method of warping, the bow of the Alligator was run up to the boom and the winch cable was fastened securely to it. The Alligator would then be reversed until the cable had all been paid out from the drum of the winch. The Alligator tug would then be chained to some suitable anchorage, such as a rock or tree on the bank. The winch would then be engaged and the bag boom of logs would be winched down the lake to the stationary Alligator tug.
Using these methods an Alligator could move up to 60,000 logs in a single bag boom in calm weather. Even under adverse conditions, with a strong headwind, the Alligator could still move 30,000 logs in a boom. This was a big improvement over the old cadge-crib method, which normally could not operate under adverse wind conditions. This meant that between 2 and 3 million board feet of material could be warped by the Alligator in a single bag boom. This, in turn, amounted to a significant percentage of the total annual cut of many of the sawmills. The Alligator, under ideal conditions, with a full bag boom of 60,000 logs, travelled at a speed of about 1 mile per hour. With fewer logs or adverse weather conditions, the speed would vary up or down. With no tow, an Alligator could reach speeds of 5 to 6 miles per hour.
In 1891, West & Peachey built a Alligator Warping Tug, named the Saginaw, for J.W. Howry and Sons of Saginaw, Michigan. It was the fourth one built by the firm and was ordered for warping logs in timber limits being logged along the Whitefish River on the north shore of Georgian Bay. The following testimonial attests to the tugs merits and the satisfaction of its owners:
Alligator #4
Saginaw, E.S. Michigan
November 16, 1891
Messrs West and Peachey, Simcoe, Ontario
Gentlemen,
In reply to yours of recent date in which you ask for a testimonial in regard to the working of the steam warping tug — “Saginaw” which we purchased of your firm last spring we are pleased to say that after using the boat for one season and having thoroughly tested it, we find that it does all and more than you claim. It is certainly worthy of our most hearty recommendation and we shall be pleased to reply to any parties whom you may refer to us. — We, this year, handled 300,000 logs with the “Saginaw”, and consider that she saved her cost to us in this one season’s work. The above number of logs were moved with the assistance of eight men, in one half the time it took us the previous year to move 126,000 pieces with cadj crib and sixteen men. We took the boat out on land and around dams and riffles and went up grades where the rise was one foot in three. We find the
“Saginaw” very useful in breaking in high “rollways” and also in towing scows loaded with supplies, up the creeks.
Yours truly,
(Signed) J.W. Howry & Sons4
ALLIGATOR #5
The fifth Alligator Warping Tug to be built was ordered by the Saginaw Salt and Lumber Company, who were operating on the Wanapitei River in northern Ontario. As work progressed on it during the winter of 1891–92, several improvements and modifications were introduced into its construction. As changes were made, all were incorporated into the tugs that followed. On March 31, 1892, the fifth Alligator Warping Tug, this one named Lorne, was shipped by rail to a northern destination.
An interesting description of the West & Peachey foundry as it appeared to a casual visitor in the spring of 1892 is to be found in the March 23, 1892, edition of the British Canadian, a Norfolk County newspaper. Written by Captain John Spain of Port Dover who wrote under the nom de plume of the “Rambler,” his account reports:
Alligators
Your rambling scribe called on Messrs. West and Peachey recently and found everybody; from the unassuming proprietors down to the apprentice boys, as busy as bees. Both flats, the yard and the street are strewn with disjointed parts of steam alligators or warping tugs. The second flat is used for the manufacture of pilot houses, steering gear, paddle wheels, boxes etc., which are nicely painted, then numbered and packed, with the name of each alligator marked on the boxes and cases containing the various parts. In the large machine shop you are bewildered with what is going on there in the shape of boring, drilling, trimming and polishing iron and steel.
The clanking sledge and clinking hammer talking with the ringing anvil to outvie the humming machinery, puts all other conversation out of the question, but your eyes can feast on huge wheels, steam boilers and bright engines. In the centre of the room is a templet or matrix, where the boilers and engines, together with their connections, are fitted exactly the same as if in the boat; they are then numbered, as above stated, knocked down and packed, ready for shipment. The hull of the boat is treated in the same way. Every bolt, spike or nail is got ready here, and each alligator is shipped in this knocked down style to its destination. Then Mr. West, with a gang of men, will go and put them together and start them through lakes and over portages to do the work for which they are so well adapted. Messrs West and Peachey are going to complete one of these alligator boats, put life in it, and make it crawl to the station and creep up onto a flat car, notice of which will appear in the town papers …
ORDERS FOR MACHINERY ONLY
In 1892, West & Peachey received their first request, for the machinery only, for construction of an Alligator Warping Tug. The request came from the McLachlin Bros., who were Ottawa River lumbermen located in Arnprior, Ontario. They, and some others, preferred to buy the steam engine and machinery and then construct their own warping tug on site.
Alligator #6, the Madawaska,