VALENTINE'S MANUAL
 

FAMOUS HUDSON RIVER STEAMBOATS

The Hudson River, famed in song and story, has
played an important part in the history and development
of New York as the great Metropolis of the Western
Hemisphere.

While civilization followed Hendrick Hudson into the
Hudson River Valley, years before this the Indians used
it as a thoroughfare between the waters of New York
Bay and the Mohawk and the Great Lakes.

By the opening of the Erie Canal in 1825, the route
of which followed the old "Mohawk Trail" of the In¬
dians, the Hudson River became the connecting link be¬
tween the Great Lakes and the Atlantic Ocean, and New
York at once assumed her place in the commercial su¬
premacy of the Eastern seaboard cities.

Following the adoption of steam navigation in 1807,
the river became the scene of some of the most remark¬
able developments in steamboat construction, and a large
fleet of river steamboats came into existence. The boats
on the Hudson River became noted all over the world,
and their names became a part of the locality from which
they made their regular departures.

Probably no boat on the river, and for that matter
anywhere in this country, ever became such a prime
favorite as the "Mary Powell." She was always a
favorite among the river fleet and became a part of the
social life along the river, and for fifty-six years carried
her passengers daily between river points in quiet com¬
fort, and at a speed never equalled by more modern
steamers.

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