Description
The H. K. Bedford was built at Jeffersonville, Indiana in 1885 for the Cumberland Riverther dimensions were: 149 x 27.7 x 4.1 feet. Frequently she came out to run the low water trades on the Ohio River when the sand bars were out for air and the larger boats laid up. In those days any Cumberland River boat could come out of that creek in June and make money all summer. In August, 1886 while the Bedford was still new, she ran between Pittsburgh and Cincinnati in charge of Captain A. T. Armstrong with A. J. Slaven in the office. Captain Gordon C. Greene went to Nashville in the spring of 1890 and bought this boat for the Pittsburgh - Wheeling trade, arriving in Pittsburgh on June 22 with his new purchase, his first steamboat. Later he extended his trips to Charleston, West Virginia and built a texas while under way. In 1897 the H. K. Bedford was engaged to run low-water in the Louisville and Cincinnati trade and Captain Mary B. Greene went down as master - first time a woman had commanded any boat in the Mail Line trade! After Captain Greene had sold the boat to a new owner who had removed the texas she went down with a big cargo of apples at Carpenter's Bar, above Marietta, about 1912 and was a total loss.
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