Remember when the Penn Central hauled the last remaining ALCO DL-109, former New Haven RR PP716, over to what is now the south end of Southampton Yard in Boston and cut it up for scrap? It was one of those events that you look back on decades later and wonder what would have been needed to arrive at a different outcome.We are approaching a similar event with another unique New Haven Railroad artifact, the railroad tug BUMBLEBEE. Retired from active service due to a failure of the Cleveland Diesel main engine, the BUMBLEBEE was purchased by Eastern Towboat in Charlestown, Mass. and has been used as a machinery parts source for their tug CYNTHIA, which has identical machinery. Externally the BUMBLEBEE is visually complete except for the lifeboat (landed years ago in favor of an inflatable raft) and two cowl vents (replaced by power vents). She still has her railroad towing mast and tall pilothouse, they were never cut down as she remained employed by New York Cross Harbor RR until the late 1980s.The owner has tried to find an individual or group with an interest in preserving the tug as a display, but this has not developed, and it is likely that she will be scrapped soon.If there were a desire to set up a display which honors the thousands of railroaders who worked in Railroad Marine Departments, this vessel would certainly be the ideal centerpiece of such a project. Her hull is heavily constructed and her weight is within the range that she could be lifted by some of the heavy construction cranes in the NY Harbor area. If a suitable location and sponsoring organization could be found in the NY City area, and ideal use for this vessel would be as a display sitting in a cradle on shore in a small park. It would be much less expensive to maintain her as a shore display than in the water, and the interior could be restored in the longer term.Unfortunately, few railroad museums acknowledge marine operations, and some marine historical groups look on railroad tugs as being "work boats" and not worthy of their attention. Does anyone have any ideas to offer on possible ways to preserve the BUMBLEBEE?

mxdata,I am not sure if part of your closing statment is really true, that few railroad museums acknowledge the marine ops. One main reason that most railroad museums don't acknowledge the Marine ops divisions is that their core railroad(s)/divisions didn't have a Marine ops component, outside of wharf railroads. Thus the topic is outside their scope, since most museums are not general railroad museums, they are focused on specific Railroad Company(s). The other problem with the preservation of something like the Bumblebee, is that most Railroad Museums are too far inland to put something like her on display without cutting her up into 6-10 pieces minimum for the move to be economical, sort-of, and then have to weld her back together.With Marine Museums, most of them don't want tugs, because they are `Ugly' when compared to the crowd pleasing Cutters, Sloops and Passenger ships. Same thing happends in the RR Museums when it comes to support equipment. How many museums have preserved (other then for use and stored outback) Trackmobiles/Car Movers, Ballast Tampers, Burro Cranes, High Rail Trucks, Regulators, etc...Just my observations,Rich C.

Yes, the tugs are indeed orphans. In the Northeast, the NHRR, LIRR, NYC, ERIE, LV, DL&W, PRR, CNJ, B&O, RDG, and others had tug operations, but many museums that cover those railroads don't cover the marine operations or even have a Walthers HO Railroad Tug (which is a pretty accurate model of the BUMBLEBEE, by the way) on display.

The San Francisco Maritime Museum has the Western Pacific tug "Hercules". I believe she is close to operable. Near by in Fisherman's wharf, a former railroad car ferry slip has been preserved by the port authority.List member Ted Miles is a curator at the maritime museum and may be able to elaborate.It seems many of the California railroad museums have a collection of track equipment, mostly for its utility value. But... the Niles Canyon Ry track crew has been known to decorate some of their maintenance equipment for Christmas, for display as their "Train of Lights" passes by (known as the "Ballast Tamper of lights")

The quick answer is that there are very siginificant pieces of NY harbor railroad marine equipment left, and they are dwindling in number each year. The only pieces preserved so far are a couple of tugs and a handful of barges. None (I beleive) are affiliated with a railroad museum.The NJ state museum project had the best chance of representing railroad marine ops when it was considered for the CNJ terminal in Jersey City, But the state tore down all the marine buildings and the political winds have stalled the museum anyway.Boats are a tough one. RMNE would be perfect, but where would it go? Same for a Reading tug to Hamburg, a LV tug to Strasburg and so on.Rob

It seems to me that the best choice for preserving a 106 foot long railroad tugboat like the BUMBLEBEE is to have a heavy lift crane take it out of the water and put it on a cradle ashore. This greatly reduces the salt exposure and resultant rust and corrosion. The second best choice would be to get the boat into fresh water, take it up a river, but then you have to deal with hull issues and its safety afloat, plus the problems of providing access to visitors.In a cradle ashore it could be the centerpiece of a display area in a small park, and the interior of the vessel would not necessarily have to be restored any time in the near future. Unfortunately I am afraid that none of these alternatives are likely to happen and the BUMBLEBEE may eventually end up being part of some future foreign car I buy. But I just wanted to let you all know about the tug in case anyone out there has some contacts or ideas that might be useful in saving the vessel.By the way, for those who are not familiar with this tug, her lines were done by Joe Hack (who designed many of the Moran Towing tugs built in the 1940s and 1950s) and the BUMBLEBEE is a very nicely styled vessel. The BUMBLEBEE has molded hull plates, a construction method not used nowadays, and is a fine example of 1950s marine design. The Walthers HO scale railroad tug kit was based on the design of the Joe Hack tugs.

CRIJ,I have to disagree that maritime museums do not like tug boats. In the United States the WWII Submarine is the most popular in numbers and tug boats are second after them.My own museum in SF has two tug boats the Hercules as mentioned by Randy and a wooden gas tug the TELCO which we keep operational.As far as the New York area goes, there is already a lot of preservation in progress. South Street Seaport Museum has a 1097 steam tug now Dieselized called the Helen McAllister and a smaller wooden tug called the W.O. Decker. She is shortly going up the Hudson for a $100,000 rebuild.But the SSSM is just the tip of the iceburg in New York. there are several one ship preservation groups active. I am not sure of the details but a 19th Century Kosnak tug that was a New York Central tug and she has just been in a Staten Island Ship Yard.there are two publications that are important to this discussion. TUG BITTS, published in Massichusetts and The TRANSFER out of Maryland is a magazine that has published over thirty issues about Railroad Navy specifically.Please e-mail me for a New York area contact who has details on this subject.Yes, tugs are Cool! You bet they are well liked!Ted Miles

Interestingly, in Kingston NY , on the Hudson River, or actually justa short bit upstream of the Rondout Creek, is both a trolleymuseum and a Maritime museum. There is a steam tugsitting high and dry in a cradle on shore. Just a fewhundred yards downstream is a collection of tugs lookingfor a permanent home. One of these is a large coastalsteam tug used to tow coal schooner barges. The areais being developed with city involvement and forwhatever reason, it seems they have little enthusiasmfor a tug museum. No doubt they feel the tax returnon condos or hotels or whatever will be more thana museum. I only know what I see and read inthe papers.Yes, the time is at hand where the last of theeasily purchased old tugs in coming to an end.