Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1901-12-19
HE SAVED THE SCOW
A CLEVER BIT OF STRATEGY IN AN
ENGINEERING JOB.


ut is easy enough for an engineer to
show ability in New York or in other
big towns where he can get about all
| the tools and conyeniences ever devils
| ed. II is when an engineer finds him
self in the wilds of a jungle or up in
| the mountains, hundreds of miles from
| civilization. that his own natural in
| genuity and invention count said a
veteran engineer to youngster who
| had been admitted 10 the ranks of the
| Engineers club
Down in Surinam, Dutch Guiana,
where the arrival of "A sailing schooner
| causes a sensation. where a mail
steamer enters the muddy harbor once
| in two weeks to tarry two hours to get
| rid of it's mail and to take op a few
| passengers. there was once a young
| American engineer who showed that
lie had the proper spirit of invention 10
| advance him to the front ranks of the
profession. Like all the best inven-
tions. his was the simplest one and 1t
was one that was widely talked about
| among the profession to the credit OF
| the inventor.
ITO understand the story properly
| you need a trifling insight into Surf
nam and its habits. Here Indians may
| be seen on the streets wearing only a
breechcloth. The white population is
so scarce that all are thrown together
as if in one large family Englshmen,
| Americans. Germans. Dutchmen AMI
| Frenchmen all combining together and
| forming clubs and society to keep
| themselves from dying of sheer lone
| someness.
In this primitive town there was q
1 man who held the splendid monopoly
| of owning Il large Scow. That. up
! there, seems a remarkably small thing
! TO be proud of. but the value of even a
scow depends entirely upon where the
scow is and what it will cost to replace
! it. This particular scow had been built
! by American ship carpenters sent es-
! pecially from the United States at
| great expense. There was not another
scow in the entire harbor. and about
| all of the heavy river work to be done
| for the city and plantations and min
| ing companies was done by this one
vessel. Its loss therefore. would have
been not only a severe one for the own
er. who had a monopoly of the bust
ness in those days. but it would have
| been little short of a national calam-
| ity
One day. while the scow was an
chored in midstream. one of those
| smashing black squalls for which the
| tropics are famous broke over the riv-
err. and for twenty minutes you could
not see ten feet away or hear a man
| shouting at your elbow. When the
! storm finally abated, the scow was not
! to be seen. and it was found she had
! gone down. deck load and all. To most
! of us there seemed about as much
chance Of raising the vessel as there
| would be to raise an ocean steamer
| sunk in the middle of the Atlantic.
1T was about this time that the
young engineer took a hand in the
problem. He asked the dimensions OF
the scow and was told that it was u
| by SO feet. and then he announced that
if the owner would provide him with
! four men he would raise the scow for
a certain sum of money. The bargain
was made though the contractor re-
| fused To say how he would go about
the job.
Now. you must know that aside
| from the ebb and food tide. which al
ternate every six hours, there is also
| what is known as a spring tide. This
comes with the full of the moon, and it
has the effect of making a higher flood
tide than any during the month. The
! Il, ~. 81
tide. and that happens at the dark of
| the moon, with the effect that at no
other tide during the month is the ebb
| tide so low as il is nj that time. The
difference in the height of water be-
| tween the ebb at neap tide and the
flood at spring tide is considerable.
The engineer waited until neap tide.
On that day he tOwed a number of logs
down the river. These he anchored
| over the scow and sent men below to
fasten chains to one side of the scow.
and these he Fastened to the logs on
the surface. Then he waited patiently.
AS the spring tide approached he tow
ed other logs down the river until he
had enough 10 make quite a raft. and
on the day of the highest tide all the
| logs were tied together and fastened.
The tide rose steadily. and the more it
rose the more the raft Went down I'M
/ der the strain Of the pull on the chains.
At last. just as it seemed that the raft
was unequal 10 the occasion. it was
seen to bob UP violently. and n moment
+ later there was n commotion in TIE
water and the scow appeared. What
had happened. of course. was this: The
chains pulling upward OH one side of
the scow tilted it more AMI more until
the deck load began to slide off. and
/ finally. when all the stones had slid in
to the river tn, scow came up under
( its own buoyancy. The remainder WAS
simple The vessel was towed 10 the
shore. where il was hauled up on the
sand and when the water receded
holes bored into the huh caused tie