Russel Brothers Limited OWEN SOUND, ONTARIO Steelcraft Boat Builders
| Warper No. 1
Canadian List of Shipping 1956: Warper No. 1 [C.173245] registered at Montreal; built at Owen Sound in 1941. 28'1 x 8' 5 x 3'6; 5 g.t.; 3 n.t.; 35 hp. Owned by Ontario Paper Co. Ltd., Thorold, Ontario. Canadian List of Shipping 1970: Steel tug Warper No. 1 [C.173245] registered at Montreal. Built at Owen Sound in 1941. 28'; 5 g.t. Canadian List of Shipping 1994 - 95: Steel tug other [TGO] Nellie Ted Purvis [C.173245] Built at Owen Sound in 1941. 28'; 5 g.t. Owned by:
The Ontario Paper Co., Thorold, Ont. Canada (1941- 1968),
Paul D. Lecours, Marathon, Ont. Canada (1968- 1979),
Morley E. Purvis, 37 Grace St., Sault Ste. Marie, Ont. Canada (1979 - ). Sank in the mid 1980s, when under tow by the Alpha 7 halfway between Quebec Harbour (Michipicoten Island) and Mamainse Harbour.
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 | Sank in the mid 1980s, when under tow by the Alpha 7 halfway between Quebec Harbour (Michipicoten Island) and Mamainse Harbour. |
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Dennis Winko comments (Dec. 12, 2017): "Here are photos taken by my dad (Julian Winko) c. mid 40s when he worked in the bush for Great Lakes Paper." We have no idea why the gentleman above is in his underwear. Very interesting cabin modifications shown below.
June 2018: Interestingly, I came across this photo of a winch boat (c. 1948) that has that very distinctive cut out cabin as show in the middle photo above. This photo was captioned "Picture 11-5 Some logs at the Pine Falls outlet of the Manitoba Paper Company, with one of the 'alligator boats' used to move the logs in the water." I wonder if the Warper No. 1 boat migrated to Pine Falls MB at some point?
https://blackpearlcomputing.com/bio/Chapter_11.html
There are several inaccuracies in this article. June 1990 Warper No. 1 is hull 590, according to this PDF. The boat was made in 1941, not 1940. Fred Russel said Russel Brothers started the hull numbering in about 1927, not 1924. The company moved to Owen Sound in 1937, not 1938. Russel Brothers were not the first to build an all welded steel hull, but they were the first company that mass produced these. And the hull number 590 should probably be c. 1946 rather than 1941. The boat donated to the Ottawa museum was not Warper No. 1, but the G-14.
Source:
http://pubs.cif-ifc.org/doi/pdf/10.5558/tfc66302-3
Rob Marchand comments (Feb. 2021):
Here are two pictures from the April 1963 issue of the Ontario Paper company newspaper "The Observation Post". These are from a full page in the newspaper, posted in the Heron Bay Facebook group by Lynne Parkhurst LaBelle and shared here with her permission.
The photo on the right has the following caption: "Warper No. 1 is seen here leaving the townsite maintenance shop after repairs. It is on its way to the barker log pond on the Black River, in preparation for the summer logging operations."
The photo on the left has the caption: "Another view of the warper as it crosses the frozen Pic River behind a tractor. It will be assisted up the hill by one of the Company trucks." The warper is in the foreground with the tractor just in front of it. The truck is further across.
The structure is a log flume carrying debarked logs from the Black River, across the Pic River, to the shore of Lake Superior where it would be loaded onto ships. The Black River was used by Ontario Paper. The Pic River was used by American Can which towed large rafts of wood from the mouth of the Pic River to nearby Marathon Ontario.
Warper No. 1 was later owned by the father of a friend of mine, with a different cabin.
n.b. - I don't think the boat below is Warper No. 1 with a new cabin, I think it is another boat that was named something similar, Warp #1 (Montreal) or W. No. 1. In any case, it did become the Nellie Ted Purvis. - Steve Briggs.
Rob Marchand comments (Dec. 26, 2018): "This is my brother and I sitting on top of W. No. 1 (later Nellie Ted Purvis), at the mouth of the Pic River. The tug was owned at this point by Paul Lecours. Our families were long-time friends in Marathon. We were about to depart to a camp at the mouth of the White River for a week of camping/fishing. I don't know if the tug had another name at that point, but it did have the life preserver labelled as "W. No. 1". This would have been about 1969 or 1970."
For more Russel exhibits visit Owen Sound Marine & Rail Museum 1165 1st Ave West, Owen Sound, ON N4K 4K8
(519) 371-3333  http://marinerail.com |
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