The star and Newark advertiser. [volume] (Newark, N.J.) 1908-1909, 1908-03-31
NOT MANY MEN WOULD
WANT M'MAHAN'S JOB.
The Man Who Blows Up Wrecks
from the Bottom of
the Ocean.

his BUSINESS TO DlOW up wrecks dne
derelicts, and a secondary eonsidera
ton is to keep himself sufficiently as
sembled to be able to repeat his tricl
as often as the government calls OF
him.
His esca pes from death have been s.
frequent that he talks of them now il
an even voice and without any hare
pedaling. He has often beaten death il
a race to the top of the water. He
sleeps with a stick of dynamite undei
his pillow and finds that it induces ex,
tremely pleasant dreams.
He worked as a diver about three
weeks, when he went to New York ano
shipped as a cabin boy on a vesse'
bound to England. He followed the sea
for years and worked up to the posi-
ton of captain of one of the clipper
ships out of Boston. He gave up the
sea in 1881 and went back to his old
home In Ohio, where he remained a
year.
He saw an announcement that the
government wanted men to do the work
of blowing up wrecks. clearing obstruc-
tions, etc, and applied for the position.
The first work that was laid out for
me- said Captain McMahan, was to
blow up a sunken schooner off Newport.
I found a man with a small catboat to
lend me and l shall not forget the ex-
perience l had iE a long time. The man
did not know his business, and at one
time would give me too much air. while
at others l had hardly enough to sus-
tain me. I expected momentarlly that
my supply of air would be cut off, and
I did some tall worrying down under
the wreck, in my diving suit.
About that time there was a vessel
sunk on the Pollock Rip Shoal, and I
was sent to blow her up. I went to
Chatham and walked down to the shore
looking for a mar and a BOAT suitable
for my purpose. I saw a sloop about
thirty feet long and made up my mind
that if the owner of the boat was any
good l would get her.
II found the owner, a tall, keen-eyed
man about my own age, Captain
George w. Crowell, and made up my
mind at a glance that he was the sort
of man I wanted. His sloop, the Pen
rose, is one of the ablest little craft I
ever stepped aboard. 1 engaged him.
He can handle his craft in splendid
shape, and when I go over the side
and give him my life line I feel just
as safe as if l was on shore. 1 would
go down to a wreck without him."
When asked what he thought was
the hardest job he ever undertook he
81 think 1t was the blowing up of
K. Vanderbilt's big steam
yacht, the Alva, which was run into
and sunk by the H. M. Whitney in the
Handkerchief channel. 1 had to use
one charge of LOO pounds of guncot-
ton and dynamite before she would
up at all. If I remember rightly
I used a little over four tons of dyna-
on her.
Once when [ was at work on a lit
lie vessel in Hyannis harbor,' said Cap
tain McMahan, IT had a narrow escape.
The vessel had caught fire and ran
into the harbor, where she sank in
about twelve or fourteen feet of water.
suppose I got a bit careless, being in
such shallow water. 1 went down on
The port side and walked around the
bow, looking for a good place to put
a charge. l had got around the bow
2 my NV AAA0 oo Noh6AAH |
Of going back and clearing it, as II
should have done, I gave it a pull.
Captain Crowell, thinking | wanted
to come up. began to pull on the line.
| was not expecting this inc was
off my feet and pulled under
the forefoot of the vessel. l realized
hat 1 was in a bad predicament, and,
TO make matters worse, my air pipe
damned and I was not getting
air. 1t was a case of work
quick or die of suffocation. You bet I
II first got off my lead shoes and
then dropped the lead belt around my
/ reached quickly for my life
inc and air pipe, and, taking a turn
in the latter, with my knife ! cut both
the life line and the hose.
Captain Crowell. as he pulled on the
Inc, realized that something was
but before he could decide what
had happened | had come to the sur
Captain Crowell caught me and
hauled me aboard the sloop. He worked
fast as he could to get my helmet
off, and when he succeeded was about
all in.
I'm a job like the one l am doing now
have on board the sloop about a ton
IF dynamite. but there is no danger,
lot half as much as there is with gaso-
inc. l have a twenty-pound can OF
dynamite under my pillow so my head
will be high, but I never losetany sleep
IT,"
Before Captain McMahan took up this
work for the government the work was
ct Out to contractors, who Used mines.
TO blow up a wreck cost from $12, 900 to
900 under the old system. but o
he work is done for practically as
hundred dollars.
Pollock Rip, where I frequently have
10 go down, is by all odds the worst
on the coast. The Jessie Barlow,
or instance, lay about twelve miles off
shore, where the tide runs six or seven
xnots, the water is gray with sand, and
slack lasts only from fifteen to
thirty minutes. l have had the current
IN those shoals swing me off my feet,
so That ] had to drag myself back on
hands and knees. It's dangerous, I adj
nit, but with a sane man at the upper
srd of things, Tn likely to get out all
ight."-Boston Herald.
M POOR MEDICAL
CORPS CAUSES BIG LOSS.