Talk:Walk-in-the-Water (steamboat)

New article

New sources and content welcomed. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 23:17, 1 October 2019 (UTC)

Images

@Gatoclass: Thanks for adding another image of Walk-In-the-Water to the article. I'm wondering, however, which image is the most accurate. The color image almost looks cartoon like, with its sidewheels unusually high above the water, and pronounced hull jutting up in the air, almost making the vessel look surreal, while the other image looks more in line with steamboats of the era. If there is no way to ascertain which image is the more accurate I would prefer the B&W image for the lede and the DYK image, as it looks more realistic structually. What say you? -- Gwillhickers (talk) 00:11, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

Gwillhickers, the good news is that I've managed to track down five or six different images of the ship. The bad news is that they are all different!

However, I have managed to track down a detailed description of the vessel from American Neptune. The steamer had an old-fashioned transom (flat) stern, typical of oceangoing sailing ships of the period but going out of fashion for steamboats. The Whistler image clearly shows that while the Stanton image does not. She also had a high quarter deck, 3 1/2 feet higher than the spar deck, which allowed rooms for the cabins below and an elevated platform for sightseers (and for the crew, as the steering wheel was on the quarter deck). Again, the Whistler image clearly shows that while the Stanton image shows the vessel with a flush (flat) deck.

One of the most interesting and unique features of the steamer though, was the arrangement of her engine. Now I must confess that I'd been looking at the Whistler image and thinking, well that just looks totally unrealistic, because the housing for the crosshead engine is forward of the paddlewheels when it should be smack in the middle, on the line where the crankshafts would have run to the centre of the paddlewheels. The only way that could have been the arrangement, I concluded, was if perhaps it had been fitted with flywheels driven by the engine which in turn drove the paddlewheels. But then listen to the Neptune's description of the engine:

The engine ... was described as a curious arrangement of levers with as many cogs as a grist-mill. The motion of the piston was imparted to the paddle-wheels by a train of gears turned by connecting rods on the sides of an A frame, working from a vertically moving cross-head.

In short, it sounds as if even this apparently incongruous detail in the Whistler sketch may have accurately depicted the location of the engine! So I am persuaded that the Whistler sketch is very likely an accurate rendition of the vessel as it appeared at the time.

On the minus side, the colours are likely inaccurate as so far as I am aware, the original Whistler image was black-and-white, meaning that the colours were probably added by the 1871 lithographer who almost certainly invented colouring of his own to make the image more saleable. The other issue is that the lithographer appears to have moved the second mast from the stern to between the paddlewheels, where the original Whistler image shows it in the stern as with all the other images. So if you like I can swap the colour image with the Whistler original. Gatoclass (talk) 12:17, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

Thanks for all of your research. The two images in question look similar in terms of the smoke stack location, in front of the paddle-wheels, standing in the front half of the vessel. However, the colors in the Whistler image as you mentioned do look out of place, making the vessel almost look as if it belonged to the circus, and again, that oversized bow-shaped hull looks odd, esp in front. The paddle wheels appear so far above the water they almost look as if they're sitting on the deck. Also, for a steamboat whose top speed was 6 mph, the Whistler images appears to be going quite fast, going by its prominent wake, and the way the smoke from the stack is streaming back, completely horizontal. I wanted to check with you first, because if the Whistler image was indeed the more accurate of the depictions I would leave it. All things considered, however, it would seem the B&W image is the better of the two, regardless of the stern configuration, as again, most steamboats of the era look similar, from what I've seen at least. We can still mention the description differences in one of the captions. If you see no other issues to speak of you can swap the images out. That would be my preference at least. Your call. -- Gwillhickers (talk) 20:45, 11 November 2019 (UTC)

@Gatoclass: — Some hours later: I swapped out the images. I'm unclear about the accounts of the vessel's appearance. e.g.Notice the fore-mast, it's lowered, but in the other image it's raised. Again, the paddle-wheels in the Whistler image look almost ridiculous so far above the water. Seems no image is perfect as accounts go, esp in regards to the overall hull in the Whistler image. It almost looks like a rocking horse, with sails. All due respect, -- Gwillhickers (talk) 05:08, 12 November 2019 (UTC)

The elongated (oval-shaped) paddlewheels and somewhat exaggerated curved hull shape were very common features of 19th-century steamboat illustrations, indeed the tradition of elongating ships in the vertical plane can probably be traced back hundreds of years. I don't know why some artists adopted this approach, but my guess is that it made the ship larger and its features more apparent with respect to the background. Possibly they just thought it made for a more picturesque and attractive image, which in some respects it does.

I give credit to the viewer to understand that such images are not meant to be taken completely literally, in just the same way as an impressionist painting, for example, captures a certain essence of the subject without trying to be photorealistic. It should be obvious to the viewer, in images such as this, that paddlewheels could not possibly be oval-shaped, they would have to be circular, and that the image is therefore somewhat stylized. However, I don't have time to debate the issue further, as the article will be featured in a few hours on the main page, so I have, albeit reluctantly, restored the Stanton image to the DYK set as you requested. Perhaps we can continue the debate another time. Gatoclass (talk) 15:07, 12 November 2019 (UTC)