From (Dr.) John Vonderlin
Email John ([email protected])
The Year was 1892
Hi June,
This is from the July 21st, 1892 issue of “The Morning Call.” This story about the types and maintenance of shipping buoys along the West Coast is just one of a number of stories the Madrono appears in through the years. Our rugged coast and not so pacific ocean saw to that. Enjoy. John
OFF WITH THE BUOYS.
The Tender Madrono Starts on
Her Southward Trip
To Visit All the Stations and Replace Buoys
Between San Francisco and San Diego.
Her Southward Trip
To Visit All the Stations and Replace Buoys
Between San Francisco and San Diego.
An Outline of the Steamer’s Work
The steam lighthouse-tender Madrono
left Broadway wharf yesterday morning
for the southern station of the local buoy
and lighthouse district, to be absent three
weeks. During this time the tender will
take up, examine and replace all the buoys
between San Francisco and San Diego.
The operations will be directed by Com –
mander Thomas Perry, U. S. N., and the
steamer will also take down enough sup –
plies to certain lighthouse stations to last
for one year.
The work of changing and repairing the
buoys is quite important, for these aids to
navigation are often struck by passing
steamers, broken, penetrated or drifted out
of position by passing steamer in the night
time. In such cases either the line of flota –
tion of the buoy is altered and is seen with
difficulty, or. being removed from its true
position, it becomes a source of danger and
a false guide instead of an element of
safety.
The Madrono’s deck when she left looked
as if an assortment of gigantic pumpkins
had been dumped on it. She carries all the
different classes of buoys, namely,
“whistlers,” bell, nun, can and spar buoys,
each of which has a utility of its own.
Where a buoy is found to be simply foul
and rusty it is taken up, scraped, repainted
and put down at some other point on the
trip, being replaced by one of the new
buoys, If the buoy is damaged, it is brought
back to Goat Island station for repairs and
a new one put down.
The first stopping place of the Madrono
on this trip will be Point Montara, in Half –
moon Bay. Next she will stop successively
at Pigeon Point, Ano Nuevo, Santa Cruz,
Point Pinos and Point Sur in Monterey
Bay; Piedras Blancas. San Luis Obispo.
Point Harford, Point Conception. Santa
Barbara, Point Hueneme. Point Fermin
and all the stations in San Diego Bay.
The Madrono is a sister ship to the Man –
zanita, which is the buoy and lighthouse
tender for the Oregon and Washington dis –
trict. A quarterly round trip is supposed to
be made in each district. The Madrono
will be remembered as the craft which
took out the body of King Kalakaua to the
Charleston when the latter went to Hono –
lulu.
The different kinds of buoys which the
Madrono carries are all represented in San
left Broadway wharf yesterday morning
for the southern station of the local buoy
and lighthouse district, to be absent three
weeks. During this time the tender will
take up, examine and replace all the buoys
between San Francisco and San Diego.
The operations will be directed by Com –
mander Thomas Perry, U. S. N., and the
steamer will also take down enough sup –
plies to certain lighthouse stations to last
for one year.
The work of changing and repairing the
buoys is quite important, for these aids to
navigation are often struck by passing
steamers, broken, penetrated or drifted out
of position by passing steamer in the night
time. In such cases either the line of flota –
tion of the buoy is altered and is seen with
difficulty, or. being removed from its true
position, it becomes a source of danger and
a false guide instead of an element of
safety.
The Madrono’s deck when she left looked
as if an assortment of gigantic pumpkins
had been dumped on it. She carries all the
different classes of buoys, namely,
“whistlers,” bell, nun, can and spar buoys,
each of which has a utility of its own.
Where a buoy is found to be simply foul
and rusty it is taken up, scraped, repainted
and put down at some other point on the
trip, being replaced by one of the new
buoys, If the buoy is damaged, it is brought
back to Goat Island station for repairs and
a new one put down.
The first stopping place of the Madrono
on this trip will be Point Montara, in Half –
moon Bay. Next she will stop successively
at Pigeon Point, Ano Nuevo, Santa Cruz,
Point Pinos and Point Sur in Monterey
Bay; Piedras Blancas. San Luis Obispo.
Point Harford, Point Conception. Santa
Barbara, Point Hueneme. Point Fermin
and all the stations in San Diego Bay.
The Madrono is a sister ship to the Man –
zanita, which is the buoy and lighthouse
tender for the Oregon and Washington dis –
trict. A quarterly round trip is supposed to
be made in each district. The Madrono
will be remembered as the craft which
took out the body of King Kalakaua to the
Charleston when the latter went to Hono –
lulu.
The different kinds of buoys which the
Madrono carries are all represented in San
Francisco harbor. The whistling buoy is
on the bar, six miles out. It consists of an
iron pear-shaped bulb, 12 feet across at the
widest part. floating 12 feet out of the
water. Inside the bulb is a tube 33 inches
across, extending from the top through the
bottom to a depth of 32 feet into water, free
from wave motion. The great bulb which
buoys up the whole mass rises and falls
with the motion of the wave, so that as the
buoy falls with the wave the air in the
tube is compressed and forced with great
violence through a whistle at the top. The
sound produced can be heard miles away
and is of an inexpressibly mournful charac –
ter.
The bell buoy is usually put down within
harbors or in shallow water or in rivers
where the sound range is shorter and
smoother water prevails. It has the ad –
vantage, like the whistling buoy, of acting
in fogs, which render all other buoys use –
less, since they cannot be seen,
The spar buoy is simply a long conical
log, painted with colored horizontal stripes,
so as to make them conspicuous. They have
the disadvantage of being exposed to injury
from the propellers of passing steamers,
but are otherwise cheap and serviceable.
The nun buoy is almost conical in form;
the can buoy is “” in shape the frustum** of a
cone nearly approaching the cylinder.””(sic) It is laid
on the bar, six miles out. It consists of an
iron pear-shaped bulb, 12 feet across at the
widest part. floating 12 feet out of the
water. Inside the bulb is a tube 33 inches
across, extending from the top through the
bottom to a depth of 32 feet into water, free
from wave motion. The great bulb which
buoys up the whole mass rises and falls
with the motion of the wave, so that as the
buoy falls with the wave the air in the
tube is compressed and forced with great
violence through a whistle at the top. The
sound produced can be heard miles away
and is of an inexpressibly mournful charac –
ter.
The bell buoy is usually put down within
harbors or in shallow water or in rivers
where the sound range is shorter and
smoother water prevails. It has the ad –
vantage, like the whistling buoy, of acting
in fogs, which render all other buoys use –
less, since they cannot be seen,
The spar buoy is simply a long conical
log, painted with colored horizontal stripes,
so as to make them conspicuous. They have
the disadvantage of being exposed to injury
from the propellers of passing steamers,
but are otherwise cheap and serviceable.
The nun buoy is almost conical in form;
the can buoy is “” in shape the frustum** of a
cone nearly approaching the cylinder.””(sic) It is laid
down according to a fixed rule, well
known to navigators, and channels opening
from the sea have red buoys with even
numbers on the right and black with odd
numbers, on the left side.
known to navigators, and channels opening
from the sea have red buoys with even
numbers on the right and black with odd
numbers, on the left side.
**Frustum, frusta, or frustrum is a portion of a solid–usually a cone or pyramid–which lies between two parallel planes cutting the solid. Try Wikipedia if you need a diagram of one, I did. Enjoy. John
