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Book examines history of the Mosquito Fleet

By John Larson

Before roads were commonplace in our region, the steamboats that came to be known as The Mosquito Fleet played a key role in the development of Puget Sound. The Mosquito Fleet was a crucial piece of the transportation infrastructure for approximately 50 years starting in 1880. They began to fade out of relevance as cars, and by 1920 ferries would shuttle cars on the water, pushing them into retirement.

Authors Robin Patterson and Jean Cammon Findley chronicle this era in their new book “Mosquito Fleet of South Puget Sound.”

Patterson lives in Gig Harbor. He remembers riding steamers on Lake Washington in the 1940s. A retired Pierce County Sheriff’s Deputy, he owns the tugboat “Joe.”

Cammon Findlay lives on Vashon Island. One of her grandfathers and two great-uncles were steamboat engineers, while three great-uncles were captains. Her father was a commercial fisherman in Alaska and her other grandfather was commander of the bark Levi G. Burgess.

The authors used their ties to local history circles in their research.

Findlay volunteers for Vashon-Maury Island Heritage Association, one organization that loaned photographs for the book.

Patterson volunteers at Museum of Puget Sound, a treasure trove of maritime heritage on Stretch Island. The lasting legacy of the late Bill Somers, who spent decades collecting the contents of his museum at the old St. Charles Winery, the museum provided use of numerous photographs. It is good to see Somers’ collection is being overseen by people interested in sharing the stories they tell.

As with other books from Arcadia Publishing, this is heavy on photographs. Most of the information is conveyed in the cutlines.

Sol G. Simpson arrived in Washington in 1877. By 1900 he owned the largest logging company and was the largest employer in the state. He died in 1906. The following year the boat S.G. Simpson was built for Shelton Transportation Company. A picture shows the original version with the 117-foot hull. Below is one showing a superstructure that was added later. It ran the route between Tacoma, Olympia and Shelton.

These boats, whether used to haul cargo or passengers, were owned by private-sector operators. Hard to believe in our current era, when the government and media fret over how to pay to maintain the state government’s ferry system, that at one time the entrepreneurs stepped in to fill the need.

They found niches to fill in the economy of transporting goods and people. Many of them secured mail routes. Others moved agricultural crops.

The majority of boats in the book met tragic ends, either sinking, consumed by fires when docked or simply being abandoned, as what happened to S. G. Simpson in 1945.

The book is divided into six chapters. The first examines the origins of the Mosquito Fleet, while the last covers the end of the era. Between are chapters dedicated to specific geographic areas of the South Sound.

Along the way are stories, often tragic, associated with particular boats. Edith H., a small mailboat, was best known for a passenger who fatally shot the engineer and himself in 1924. Or Verona, forever tied to its role in Bloody Sunday, when it carried Wobblies to a protest in Everett on Nov. 5, 1916. In the encounter with the police and residents who were waiting for them, five Wobblies died and 31 others were wounded.

Findlay and Paterson will talk about “Mosquito Fleet of South Puget Sound” at Kings Books in Tacoma at 7 p.m. May 8 and hold a book signing at Vashon Bookshop on Vashon Island at 7 p.m. May 30.

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