One of the dark secrets of the west coast salmon canning trade in the early 20th century was the notorious life aboard the Hell Ships, made infamously known by Max Stern’s detail expose in 1922. Gambling, bootlegging, profiteering, exploitation, disease, even death marked the voyage that Stern took aboard the wooden clipper Emily F. Whitney. It took one month to reach Bristle Bay, Alaska. However, the drama allowed Stern to fill pages of San Francisco Daily with his month-long adventures on the high sea. But just imagine how the story would turn out if the mode of transportation were different if in lieu of the wooden bark or the windjammer Stern were shipped out on a steam or diesel powered steel ships. Both the trip and the story would be cut short. But that was exactly the tale of two cities – San Francisco and Seattle at the turn of the century. Follow the lead by APA, most canning companies in San Francisco bought old windjammers, while most companies in Seattle bought or rent steam ships. The experience of the cannery workers of each city would have been drastically different.

According to Wikipedia on APA’s Star Fleet: “Shortly after the turn of the 20th century, the APA began to replace its wooden ships with iron-hulled vessels by purchasing a number of ships built by Harland & Wolff Co. for James P. Corry and Co.’s Star Line. APA purchased the following ships (in order of build) from others who had purchased from James P. Corry and Co. – Star of Italy, Star of Russia, Star of Bengal and Star of France.^[9] The first of these vessels bought by the APA was the Star of Russia. The company liked the naming pattern used for the Star Line’s ships so much that it used this pattern for the naming of its other vessels, naming them Star of Alaska, Star of Finland, etc. By 1930, most of the sailing ships were replaced with steam or diesel powered ships.”

On the other hand, during the same period of time, 1900-1930, Seattle’s canners chose steamers. Margaret Riddle wrote in History Link on 9/02/2014: “To accommodate new waterfront trade, Seattle needed more and better docks. In 1901 the Northern Pacific Railroad built Yesler Pier No. 1 and then, as this dock became quickly overcrowded, built Yesler Pier No. 2. The Seattle Times reported: “This dock, Pier 2, will be hastened to completion on account of the pressing need for it to relieve the pressure of business already accumulating at Yesler Pier No. 1. At that dock, although it is not yet completed, there are already stored immense piles of salmon from Alaska and Puget Sound canneries and every steamer from the north brings down thousands of cases to be stored there until their shipment to the East” (“One More Large Dock”).

Furthermore, she gave specific examples: “On April 2, 1900, 150 Chinese workers traveled north from Seattle aboard the steamer George E. Starr, headed for canneries in Blaine, located in Whatcom County at the Canadian border. Ten days later, 52 more Chinese workers boarded the steamer Ruth in the city, bound for canneries in Icy Straits, Alaska.”

If Stern were to sail on a steamer instead of the old bark Emily F. Whitney, one must wonder if Stern would have produced such a sensational story included in The Price of Salmon or what he termed “the scandal of the west coast salmon canning industry.”

Photo credit:

1. photo 1: George E. Starr, sidewheel steamboat, built 1879, Wikimedia Commons
2. photo 2: Star of Alaska, SF Maritime Museum