(bird calling) (banjo and harmonica music) (bell ringing) - [Narrator] The bell rang three times, to signal the start of a day on the steam-powered tow boat, the WP Snyder, Junior.

- This boat is a national historic landmark, listed as a national historic landmark in 1989.

It's the only type of riverboat of its kind left, and it's a pretty important link in the chain of history related to transportation on America's inland river systems.

- She's the last.

There really isn't another towboat around steam or diesel, really, that is in that much intact condition.

You lose her and you lose the last of a breed.

- [Narrator] The Snyder was built in 1918, and the Ohio Historical Society has been sounding the bell when it comes to the stability of the nearly 100-year-old boat for quite a while.

(bell ringing) This last of a breed may be lost, unless the sternwheeler takes a complicated lifesaving journey.

- The hull especially was in fairly fragile shape, and that we needed to replace the hull.

A hull to a boat is like a roof on a house, that keeps the water out.

So, if we didn't replace the hull at the corroded point, where it would start to leak, and heaven forbid, then our boat would would sink.

- [Narrator] In order to fix the hull, the Snyder has to take a trip from its home on the Muskingum River, in Marietta, Ohio to be worked on at a shipyard on the Ohio River, and that's no easy task.

There are several obstacles in her way.

- I'll be biting my nails just because the hull's in fragile shape, and moving it out of here is just a delicate job.

- [Narrator] It's not just a delicate job, it's a costly one.

More than a million dollars is needed to fix her up right.

- Well, there are a lot of people who really remember the Snyder, loved the Snyder, would like to see it be in better shape than it is.

The Snyder is the largest object in our collection, and it's a pretty visible object.

It's a national historic landmark.

It's the only one in the area.

So it's a pretty important thing for us to keep working on.

- [Narrator] It's important to keep working on, because if they don't, this connection to an American way of life could be lost forever.

- It's living history of a time, and a way of life on the river, of commerce on the river, that no longer exists.

- I think of this as a link in a historical chain.

You come on this boat, and you can see things that would be familiar to Mark Twain.

- [Narrator] And that's why it's all about, "Saving the Snyder."

(birds chirping) It's November 20th, 2009, the day of the big move, a day that necessity has brought about.

- [Jeff] I never really pictured what it would be like when it did happen.

So it's really fantastic, it's really, everybody here is really happy about it, that this is finally underway.

- [Narrator] But it's taken several years to get here.

- It's just wonderful to see, that this, the boat's finally leaving to get a new hull put underneath it.

I'm very excited.

- It's hard to believe.

It's really happening after all this time, actually.

- [Narrator] Today, the WP Snyder, Junior steamboat is getting ready to take one of the most important trips of its nearly century-long life.

- It tell you the truth, I'm I'm not too worried.

I think everybody recognizes what fragile shape the hull is in, and they're gonna take every measure to make sure it gets to the yard safely, and then it gets back again.

So to tell you the truth, I'm not too nervous about it, and that's just because of the confidence I have in the people that are in charge of the project.

- We kind of expect that there'll be some water coming in, because it's kind of equalized right now.

And once it's gets out on the water, things will kind of loosen up, probably expect to see some, a little bit of water, but we're prepared for that.

- [Narrator] Many believe the risk is worth taking to make sure that a boat that is a key part of our nation's past has a bright, secure future.

A seemingly minor event in history occurred in 1918 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

- The James Rees Company built the boat in downtown Pittsburgh, in 1918.

The James Rees and Sons yard was about where the Gateway Center is in downtown Pittsburgh, today.

- [Narrator] She was constructed to be put to work immediately.

There was a job to be done.

- The boat was commissioned by the Carnegie Steel Company, commissioned to push coal barges from mines along the Monongahela in West Virginia, up to Carnegie Company's steel mills in the Pittsburgh area.

- [Narrator] Her name back then was the WH Clingerman.

- It's called a pool boat, the pilot house is low, ahead of the cabin, and it was to bring coal out of the Monongahela River pools.

The Monongahela River was one of the first to have locks and dams in it, dating back into the 1800's.

The coal for the steel industry was moved out of the Monongahela River to the Crucible Steel Plant at Midland.

It was crucial to making steel.

The rivers were used for moving coal long before there were railroads everywhere.

- [Narrator] In 1938, she was renamed the JL Perry, but her mission didn't change.

Her work was not showy or picturesque, it was honest work on the river, work that was crucial to the steel industry.

- It helps to tell the story of industrial development in this country.

If it wasn't for boats like the Snyder, pushing tons and tons and tons of coal to steel mills around the Pittsburgh area, that the steel industry would not have developed as it did in this country.

- You know, they were just the workhorses of their time.

They weren't glamorous boats by any means, but they sure did move the coal, and that was what fired all the furnaces for the steel industry.

- [Narrator] In the spring of 1945, she was renamed the A-1.

Then in the fall of that same year, the Crucible Steel Company purchased her and named her after the company's President and Chief Executive Officer, WP Snyder, Junior.

Her job for Crucible was to tow coal barges to a plant in Midland, Pennsylvania.

And even though she did her job, well, the winds of change were blowing, and boats like the Snyder were quickly becoming a thing of the past.

- All the towboats you'll see on the Ohio River today, they have diesel engines and they have props.

This boat was powered by steam and it has a turn wheel, it has a paddle wheel.

By the mid 1950s, diesel had pretty much replaced steam power, props had replaced paddle wheels on the rivers.

- The Snyder had a crew of maybe 12, maybe 15, whereas a diesel boat that goes up and down the river today maybe has five, six.

And they were very labor intensive.

To convert them over to to oil from coal, would have saved some money, but you still had all that upkeep on the paddle wheel, and a wooden superstructure.

- [Narrator] In 1954, the Snyder's days as a working boat were done, but there was more life in her.

A second career was just around the bend.

It's moving day in Marietta, Ohio, the current home of the WP Snyder, Junior, and there's a buzz in the air.

News crews have come to town to report on the Snyder's journey.

And boat enthusiasts have traveled to the southeastern Ohio city to see the more than 90 year old ailing boat leave her post on the Muskingum River.

- It's one of the last ones, but you know, going, and we throw away too much stuff in this country, and I think we need to save some of it, so that people can see how it used to be done.

- Because it's representative of an era that's passed and we need to hang on to our heritage and remember those kinds of things.

So we can remember what life was like in the past.

- There aren't any more like it, I don't believe, and saving the boat seems like a good thing, even though money is needed everywhere in today's society, with the recession especially, and everything else.

I still think it's important to save old things because it helps us remember how things work.

- We're here to say, till we meet again.

This isn't farewell, she's gonna come back and she's gonna be better, and we're gonna get this done, thank you.

- [Narrator] As spectators attend a send off ceremony, and prepare to watch the boat leave to go get restoration work done, they're excited, and hope she will return home soon, to stay for a long time to come.

- We're curious about how they're unlashing the boat, and how they'll lash to the tug that's gonna take it up the river.

- [Narrator] People in Marietta were also curious and excited in September, 1955, when the WP Snyder, Junior first came to town.

The miracle of a second chance at life was about to happen for the WP Snyder, Junior in the early 1950's.

- There are fleets of boats like this on the inland rivers around the Pittsburgh area 70 years ago.

This is the last one left.

The rest were all sent to the scrapyard and all scrapped out.

- [Narrator] But the fate of the Snyder would follow a different path, one leading to a permanent post on the Muskingum river in Marietta, Ohio.

- An organization called the Sons and Daughters of Pioneer Rivermen, and they're a river historical society.

Their president, a gentlemen named Captain Frederick Way, Junior, recognized that boats like this were going away, they were being replaced.

They were being scrapped out, and they were gonna disappear.

So he and the Sons and Daughters of the Pioneer Rivermen got together with the Ohio Historical Society and found this boat, the Snyder, and thought that it should be preserved as an example of a steam-powered towboat.

- Dad could see that river history was being lost.

He started out working on sternwheelers, and side wheelers and steam, and then he saw the diesel era and he worked on those boats, too.

And he could see all that was changing, and all those boats were disappearing.

And he always was interested in the history of the people who worked on the boats.

And he was always interested in how the boats changed over the years, and all that was being lost.

- We used to talk about what we should get and keep in the museum, you know.

Somebody would say, well, I've got an anchor, well, or I've got a bell, or I'll contribute a skiff or something.

And several times people said, well, we ought to get an old steamboat, you know.

In the 1940's and right after World War II, steamboats were being replaced by diesel boats.

And so they were retiring steamboats and there wasn't any value in them, really.

They were just being junked.

Everybody in the S and D organization felt that we, if possible, should encourage the Ohio Historical Society to add a steamboat to the museum.

- S and D and OHS approached the Crucible Steel Company of America, and talked to the Chairman of their board, who was named WP Snyder, Junior, and basically said, can we have the Snyder?

To make a long story short, he said, yes.

- [Narrator] With that 'yes' came an extravagant plan to move the boat from Pennsylvania to Marietta.

A cruise starting in Brownsville, Pennsylvania, traveling to Marietta, Ohio, during the week of September 12th, 1955.

Betty Way Rutter, the captain's daughter, was one of the passengers.

- [Betty] I remember that we had perfect weather the whole time.

We were the guests of the steel company, and I can't even tell you how many people there were.

The group kept changing all the time.

People kept getting on and off of the boat.

The boat pushed a party barge, or some kind of barge.

It was a double deck affair.

All the guests were on the barge.

We could go back and forth on to the steamboat if we wanted to, but most of us just stayed on the barge.

- [Narrator] The voyage was captured on film by Betty's husband, Joe.

- It was really the last example of a steam towboat, and certainly the way the Crucible Steel Company chose to deliver to Marietta, was an opportunity to take movies that I couldn't resist.

- In the evenings we would stop at prearranged places.

And we were put up at hotels.

All the arrangements were made, and we all had our own rooms and everything.

They gave us our dinners all together as a group and everything was paid for.

We didn't have to worry about our baggage, all that was taken care of.

We didn't worry about tipping.

We didn't worry about anything.

All that was covered, all we had to do is go along and enjoy it, and that's exactly what I did, it was wonderful.

- They stopped every night at every town they could land at, and go up the hill and they'd have these big dinners in these hotels, and then they'd set out the next morning, and somebody'd be playing in the air calliope, or somebody'd be sitting around and playing the guitar.

And you know, it just seemed like, boy what a fantasy trip that must've been.

- [Narrator] There was music and laughter on the boat.

A magical trip to mark an historic event.

Pittsburgh area banjo player, Robert Schmertz, even wrote a song about the trip, and played it while on the boat.

The song was called "The Wake of the WP Snyder, Junior."

♪ Oh captain, oh my captain ♪ ♪ Oh sweet September day ♪ ♪ There never was a captain ♪ ♪ Like Captain Frederick Way ♪ - [Narrator] But the trip wasn't only fun and magical for people on the boat, it was also the end of an era for people who lived in the river towns, the boat traveled by.

- People were watching for the boat all the way along.

People waved at us and schools were let out, especially at the dams.

Kids couldn't really see the boat up close.

And at Clarington, that's where the kids got out and had their band.

The girls, the cheerleaders were out there doing their fancy steps.

- You'd listen to some of these fellows on the Snyder cruise who had been going up and down the river for 50 years before that, and they would get into a discussion about who lived in that house, up on the Hill.

And so you're getting a history lesson as you went along.

And it was a nostalgic trip, of course, but it was made so by people who had firsthand knowledge of that life, which was disappearing with the end of the steamboat.

- At the very end, when we stopped in Marietta, everybody got off, except a very few stayed with us because the boat was going to then come up the Muskingum River.

Everybody got off on the Ohio River, down at the landing and walked up to the hotel.

But I wanted to ride clear up to on the Muskingum, the final resting place.

I guess they really wanted to kind of get some of the weight off of the boat, because the river was kind of shallow, and it was going to have to come in close to the shore.

In fact, we rubbed the willow trees as we came along.

Everything wound along okay, and we got to where we were supposed to rest.

The engineer was the last one to blow the last whistle as the steam pressure left the boat, so he was blowing the whistle until finally nothing.

And there wasn't a dry eye.

That was, you know, that was the very last sound that boat made as an alive boat.

It was kind of sad.

- [Narrator] A sad ending for the Snyder's days as a working steamboat, but a fitting beginning for its new purpose, as a floating museum in Marietta.

(acoustic guitar music) Peace of mind is what it's all about when it comes to moving the WP Snyder, Junior out of Marietta for much needed repairs.

In May, 2009, a 70-foot sternwheeler named the Karen Leigh sank on the Kanawha River in Charleston, West Virginia.

On moving day, this is exactly what those in charge of the Snyder want to prevent from happening.

- We have a couple of six inch pumps, six three inch pumps, a half a dozen two inch pumps, lots of shingles, a couple of mattresses.

We're ready for the Titanic to go down.

- [Narrator] The reason the West Virginia boat sank?

Issues with the under carriage, the same thing that needs mending on the Snyder.

- [Dwain] I mean, you just can't do anything else unless you have a new hull on your boat.

And that is really the future of the vessel.

I'll be relieved when it's back here in Marietta with a new hall underneath it.

That's when I'll finally just have the big, but I'm relieved now that it's starting.

- [Narrator] The Karen Leigh was pulled out of the river in June, 2009.

It took several divers and two cranes to get her out.

What happened to the Karen Leigh reaffirms the notion that the WP Snyder, Junior has been living on borrowed time.

When the boat moved to Marietta in 1955, it had a great purpose, sitting as a museum on the waters of the Muskingum river, but her weak body could only stay strong for so long, before the hull, the undercarriage of the boat, needed repairs.

- By 1969, that hull was in pretty bad shape.

The description that I read of it was a piece of Swiss cheese, which was a very sobering thing to read, and that there were pumps on the boat and they were running constantly from what I understand.

And, so in 1969, we had basically a big shell put over the old hull, the hull that came here in '55, we put a big shell over it and welded that on, and that took care of our Swiss cheese problem.

- [Narrator] 40 Years later, the Snyder is a popular place for school kids to take tours and learn about steamboat history.

- On the duck pond, you went underwater and you had to deal with the paddle wheel at the end of this vessel.

- [Narrator] But her hull has new issues, issues that could cause the Snyder to end up on the bottom of the Muskingum.

- What's happening is condensate is eating away the original hull, and it's eating away the hull shell, and the hull shell around the outside, the side that's in the water, is corroding also.

- And the plating in a number of different places was very thin.

In fact, when we were examining it with a hammer, we punched a couple of holes in the side plate.

- She can't last indefinitely without a lot of repairs to that hull and replacement and renewal.

Once you get that done you've got a pretty firm basis to build on.

Think of it either as the foundation or the roof.

If you've got a house that doesn't have a good roof, you're in trouble, and a boat with a bad hull, you know, she's gonna wind up on the bottom one of these days.

- [Narrator] But repairing the hull will involve the fragile boat taking a long, complicated trip down the Ohio River, to be dry docked at a shipyard.

It is a dangerous voyage for such a delicate piece of history.

- You have to take the spars off the side of her.

You have to get a smaller towboat on her.

Sometimes, maybe two, one on the head, one on the stern, and then you just sort of gently ease her down river, and then you get her into the mouth of the Muskingum river.

And then, ideally what you would do would be put two barges, one on either side of her, so that if she did start taking on water, you could have her tied to these barges.

And that would sort of keep her afloat like pontoons.

- This boat weighs 342 tons.

And you know, when you move something that big and you're responsible for it, or you're one of the people responsible for it, you just want everything to go right.

- There's a lot of soft spots in that hull, just above the water line.

You can work seams loose, welded seams, just with the motion of moving a boat.

Hulls have to give some, and even steel ones.

So as you're moving through the water, you know, you're doing a little bit of this, and some of that working can work loose seams and you can start taking water.

- Anytime you move a historic artifact like that, you just cross your fingers and hope that nothing happens, because it's become the last of the Mohicans, and if it's lost, it's lost.

- [Narrator] However, Rutter and some others in the area think the Snyder should not be in this type of jeopardy to begin with.

They think the Snyder should be on display on land.

- It does expose it to danger, and loss.

It's more expensive to keep it in the river, you have to have security and so on and so forth.

- [Narrator] But others believe the water is where the Snyder belongs.

- You take them out of their natural element and they just look ridiculous.

There's a boat over on the upper Mississippi, the George M Verde, that's been out of the water for a long time.

And they've even gone to the extremes that they drilled holes in the hull so that if the water came up, she wouldn't float out of where she is.

So a few years ago, when they had high water on the upper Mississippi river, the main deck had about three feet of water on it.

So, you know, there's a lot of practical reasons why not.

- [Narrator] No matter where they think the boat should be displayed, those who cherish the WP Snyder, Junior are just wishing their favorite boat, a safe trip, one that ends with the Snyder coming back home to Marietta, with a strong body to match her great purpose.

For the WP Snyder, Junior, money is key.

With it, she can be fixed and saved.

Without it, she could end up in storage.

- Our main goal is to put a new hull underneath the boat.

That is the most critical need.

- [Narrator] But that critical need is costly.

Just to repair the hull of the Snyder, the price tag is roughly $1.5 million.

Some of the money needed is coming in the form of state and federal grants, money that is dedicated to saving treasures like the Snyder, but the rest will have to come from the place the old girl calls home.

- I was to raise the funds, both to complete a match on the Save America's Treasures grant, and we were lacking about $50,000 of the matching money.

And I was to raise that, and raise additional money to cover the rest of the estimated cost.

And that amount was initially thought to be about $100,000.

We raised about 175,000 all told.

- [Narrator] With the money worries behind them, you would think it would be easy to just get the job done.

However, nothing with the Snyder comes easy.

- Because of the different funding sources.

We have Ohio funding sources, we have national or federal funding sources, through the park service.

We also have donors, donor funding.

There are different requirements we have to follow and be very careful about meeting those requirements for each of these funding sources.

According to the Save America's Treasures grant that we have through the park service, there are about 22 different conditions we have to fulfill in order to meet the terms of that grant agreement.

- [Narrator] As if that wasn't enough to deal with, this project seems to find delays at every turn.

- This particular project is frustrating in a certain sense, because everybody wanted it to occur sooner, and we thought it would occur sooner.

- When we first started looking for shipyards, there were very few who, first of all, could have the capability to do it, and secondly have the time.

They were all booked up.

So it's just been one roadblock after another.

- Once we started negotiating with a particular shipyard, it became clear that they were nervous about the liability of towing it, especially with the condition the hull was in.

And this is our second shipyard we've negotiated with, now we're onto our third shipyard who has insurance and that's not a problem.

- [Narrator] Next comes a new problem, lead paint.

- The holdup is the cost of the lead abatement.

The work we're doing is taking the metal plating off.

It was painted, 1950's was the last time the interior was painted, and it has lead paint on it, definitely, we've verified that.

Before they can do any welding, they have to take that lead paint off.

And depending on who you talk to, the shipyard gave us a price that was outside of our budget completely.

So we are talking to an independent subcontractor that is used to lead abatement, and he's doing some testing.

- [Narrator] The company, Lepi Enterprises, is trying a number of strategies to remove the lead paint from the hull of the Snyder, to find the one that is most cost effective.

Today, they're using a technique called ice blasting.

- It's got pelletized dry ice, and basically it's the same as sandblasting, high pressure air behind the ice.

It freezes it, I can't quote how cold it is, but it's really cold, and it knocks it off with low dust.

- [Narrator] Today's blasting will use 1000 pounds of dry ice.

Still, not everything is controlled by helpful hands.

Mother nature is also involved here.

The Snyder has to travel under three bridges to get out of Marietta.

And the Muskingum River levels may be too high when it's time to make the big move.

- [Fred] It is of concern because if we get into October or November, then the fall rain starts to come, and we might have to wait it out again until next spring, which I do not want to contemplate at this point.

- [Narrator] But Smith and others involved are optimistic that everything will come together at the right time to move the Snyder.

- Once the day comes and we do move it to the dry dock, it's really going to be an event.

It really will be super.

- [Narrator] A day on which the Snyder will be able to relive a bit of her past, and take another journey which could save her life.

A big risk is being taken with the nearly century-old WP Snyder, Junior.

It's one that could permanently damage the boat, but if the risk isn't taken, the end could be near for the river relic.

So it's a delicate situation.

- It's gonna have to go under the Washington Street Bridge, which is right near the River Museum here, and that's no problem.

That's a nice high bridge.

Then we're gonna have to go under the Putnam Street Bridge.

And the Ohio river has to be at 19 feet or lower for us to get under the Putnam Street Bridge.

And then we have to go through the Harmer Railroad Bridge.

It's a railroad bridge.

There's been a bridge on that spot since I believe 1856.

When the Muskingum was a commercial river, a span of that railroad bridge was turned open at regular, regularly to admit, to let boats go through commercial boats, go through.

Well, the Muskingum is no longer classed as a commercially navigable river, but we still have to turn the bridge open to get the boat out.

It's the span on the Marietta side of the river.

If that span don't turn, the boat don't go.

- [Narrator] Getting the span to open is itself a difficult process.

- That entails getting eight to 10 big strong people out on that bridge and getting a big key, basically, sticking the key in the thing you stick the key in, I don't have all the technical terminology, and pushing the thing open.

- [Narrator] And that's just floating the WP Snyder, Junior out of Marietta.

After that, there's a 146-mile journey, filled with unknowns and potential pitfalls to the McGinnis Shipyard in South Point, Ohio.

Even though the effort is filled with uncertainty, there is a plan in place to move the Snyder.

A plan that just like in 1955, many involved think will work, but their fingers are crossed, because they know that it's a plan that's going to need some luck to pull off.

(acoustic guitar music) The good things are arriving for the Snyder on the morning of November 20th, 2009.

The sun is coming up over the city of Marietta, and things are calm.

However, on the Muskingum, it's anything but.

It's highly unusual for the WP Snyder, Junior to travel these waters anymore.

- It's sort of the grand old lady of, you know, the working river.

And it means a lot to people.

The spectacle of it too.

It's really something to see.

She doesn't move out that often.

- [Narrator] But before she can go, the stars have to align.

The river level seems like it's cooperating, staying at or below 19 feet.

- I don't know the depth of it now, but we've got plenty of clearance.

We're hitting it right, just right.

Just before it starts to really get into the rainy season.

- [Narrator] And the river isn't the only thing cooperating on the Snyder's big day.

With the help of several strong men, the rust gives way, and the old Harmer Railroad Bridge turns open without a problem.

- [Fred] Well, they put an iron wrench on the top of it, with four little prongs, and they ran it around there like they were oxen to open it up.

And once they got it broken free, it went fine.

That's the beginning of a good day, let's hope.

- [Narrator] However, there's much more to do.

Next, shipyard workers need to remove the 175-foot Snyder from her moorings.

- So we're gonna drop our spar poles and our walkway, and then gently take it down between the bridges.

- [Narrator] Which takes time.

And while that's going on, a towboat is coming down the river to get into place.

- [Dwain] We have quite a bit of clearance, you know.

The boat's 32 feet wide, and we have a 50-foot span to drop down through, so everything should go down through, we're hoping really.

- It took a long time to get the Snyder to this day, the day she's leaving for repairs, which will keep her afloat.

- The Ohio Historical Society has the responsibility to make sure all the I's are dotted, and all the T's are crossed, and we've done that.

So let's get a new hull underneath that boat.

Let's go!

- [Narrator] And just like that, after years of worry and frustration, the Snyder is on her way.

(bell ringing) Those on board ring her bell, just like the old days.

- [Andy] She didn't have a whistle.

It wasn't under her own steam, so we couldn't blow the whistle.

And I just felt like the boat had to say, had to communicate to the people that were on the shore.

So that's why I rang the bell.

- [Narrator] After the goodbye bell rings, she heads under the first obstacle.

The Washington Street Bridge isn't a problem.

Then it's on to the Putnam Street Bridge.

And finally she passes by the old Harmer Railroad Bridge, heading out to her old stomping grounds, the Ohio River.

- [Dwain] I'm kind of thrilled about it.

It's a big adventure.

It's a big piece of equipment that has got a lot of historical value to it in my estimation.

I mean, it's the last of its kind, so you know, I'm feeling good about it.

- [Narrator] After making it out to the Ohio, the Snyder pulls off to the side of the river.

A barge is tied on each side of the boat, to protect her during the trip to South Point.

- [Fred] The purpose there was to really protect the vessel, and to give the towboats something to push.

So they were actually pushing the barges, and the boat was moored onto the barges.

So it was really the safest way to do it.

- I'm pretty confident the hull is gonna be safe getting down to South Point, which is 146 mile thing.

But I think we're gonna be all right with it.

- [Narrator] Jack Deck and Fred Smith, with the Historical Society, ride on the Snyder for the entire trip.

In the beginning it's a nerve-wracking ride.

- The dimensions of the interior structure are very light compared to let's say a cargo barge.

And this is the way the boats were built, of course, back in the teens of last century, and having seen the deterioration through all these years, why yes, I was apprehensive.

- [Narrator] However, taking on water isn't the only concern.

They have to worry about what's outside the boat as well.

- [Fred] When we went through the sets of locks, we went through, I think it was two or three sets of locks, we had about three feet either side of the barges.

So we really were tight going through the lock, but the boat was completely protected.

- [Narrator] The trip is expected to take 18 hours, hours the two spend in the boat's sleeping cabins and pilot house.

- [Fred] You don't often get a view from the river like that.

And especially being up in the pilot house, 'cause that's where we, as passengers, were the whole time.

And it was really, you know, you could kind of maybe pretend that you were the pilot of the boat, and the view that you would have of the river.

And so that was really fantastic.

- [Narrator] But then about 12 hours into the trip, a problem arises.

- [Fred] The middle of the night around 2:30, three o'clock, we ran into some heavy fog.

- It's a get the common thing, the fog, they get shut down and they tie off, and then resume after the fog lifts.

- It was a shutout fog, and the proper safety practice is to take the boat to the shore and wait it out.

And fortunately, they were near the Kyger Creek Power Plant, and there's a dock facility there.

So they just pulled over and tied it off, and the fog broke about 10 o'clock in the morning.

And then we continued our trip down.

- [Narrator] The Snyder eventually makes her way down river, but the trip ends up taking 30 hours.

Now it's time for the next hurdle, getting the large boat out of the water.

Something many thought could not happen, did.

The WP Snyder, Junior, is sitting at a shipyard in South Point, Ohio, awaiting repairs.

- Fortunately it was a very smooth trip down.

I have to have words of praise for McGinnis.

They were very professional.

They were able to get the boat out of the Muskingum River, and through the railroad bridge, without any difficulties.

And coming downriver was a very, very smooth trip.

- [Narrator] But it's been three months now since she left Marietta, and no work has been done on the boat's hull.

- We're doing the work in the winter time.

So we had to figure that there would be some delay because of weather.

We just didn't realize how much it would be.

- [Narrator] Crews have been finishing up lead abatement work while she's been in South Point.

But so far that's the only progress that's been made, until today.

On this day, the boat is being moved to dry dock.

- The dry dock is a big vessel where, you know, it's got a system of valves and pumps in it.

Once you sink the dry dock down to a certain level, with blocking on top of the deck, shove the vessel that's you're gonna be dry docking over the top of it, and turn on the series of pumps, and then not for too long there, if the pumps and everything is working correctly, it'd be up, going in our direction.

- Steve, Dwain's wanting somebody to get that ladder off the front of this boat before it gets hung up here.

- [Narrator] The Snyder needs to be moved to dry dock, so the crew can get underneath the vessel, and work can begin on replacing the hull.

A tow boat delicately pushes the Snyder down the river.

- [Fred] This is really what the whole project is for, is to get her up there and start working on that steel.

- [Narrator] Then, once she's in place above the dry dock, the pumps start working.

And before you know it, the boat appears to just bounce out of the water.

- Well, we're in the process of cropping and renewing the entire bottom and the sides.

So, you know, it's gotta be up where we can work it.

It's one of them things where you have to have dry conditions there, to crop that metal out, so they don't sink on us.

- [Narrator] With a Snyder on dry dock and secure, crews are ready to make the first cut into the steel hull.

- Yeah, we've got the lead abatement areas sealed, and we're ready to go to work.

- [Narrator] But first, surveyors have to make sure the boat can handle it.

- They were surveying and getting our alignment, to make sure that once we start cutting on it, we don't lose our shape, we don't get a Hogan effect into it.

And keep her back as close to the original as possible.

- [Narrator] Once the okay is given, welder Nick Hayes talks to Fred Smith and Jack Deck, with the Ohio Historical Society.

Since the hull of the boat was repaired with an overlay in 1969, that means there are at least two layers of steel to go through.

- See, we'll have to take the overlay off, then get to where we can see the original limbs.

Then we will do the rivets.

We'll be able to see the rivets then.

- There's two layers that has been put on prior to today, and putting a lot of extra weight on it.

We're wanting to get down to the original framework, and get it a new skin underneath there.

- [Narrator] But the two layers make things a little tricky for Hayes.

He has to make sure he doesn't damage the framework of the boat.

- Well, I hope everything goes well, I hope I don't hurt anything.

I'm gonna try my best.

- We put some bracing on it, you know.

We've got several I-beams down through there to make sure that the hull doesn't sag, or, you know, climb on one end or the other.

So I think we've made some precautions, and we'll take our time cutting, we'll do a section at a time, and put back, and hopefully everything stays in the right stature of stability there.

- [Nick] What we're gonna do is we're gonna take off a little of the old plates.

Well, I flushed instead of cut it.

I flushed the metal with a torch instead of just cutting through.

That gives me more control on what I was doing, and that the way I didn't do no damage to the original framing in there.

- [Narrator] Within minutes, the first piece of steel from the hull of the WP Snyder, Junior clangs to the ground.

(clanging) - I didn't have a whole lot of nerve problems on account I've been doing this so much, so long, but I was being very careful.

That could be the original knuckle.

- [Narrator] There's at least another layer of steel to go through.

And those with the historical society, wonder if they'll find any surprises.

There could be some other work that was done to the hull over the past 90-plus years they don't know about.

And if that's the case, the price tag for these repairs may go up, which could be a big problem.

- Go in and cut you out a little section right in here, Nick, and we'll see what we've got there.

But I think that plate is covering the original frame, looks like.

- Just take out a little bit of this knuckle.

We're gonna try this again.

See if we can get to the original.

This might be the original, but it might not be.

We'll find out right here.

- [Narrator] With a steady hand, Hayes makes his cuts to discover- - That was the original.

That's the original hull.

There's a piece of old framing right there.

If I can stick my hand up in the boat, and feel the rivets as they run down the bottom plate.

- [Narrator] So that means it's now time to proceed, removing the two steel layers of the more than 150-foot hull, which will be a long delicate process.

- We've gotta get all this old hull off, and get down to our original framework, and we will be starting our new frame, or new plating underneath it, and try to get it sealed up.

- [Narrator] While the work goes on underneath the boat, the sheet plate for the new hull has to be constructed.

It takes almost a month for the new sheet to make it to the bottom of the Snyder.

(dramatic acoustic music) It's springtime in southern Ohio.

Snow melts and mother nature gets in the way.

The McGinnis Shipyard has to deal with an overflowing Ohio River.

- That high water set us back a good week, to 10 days, you know, got us and put us out of commission.

- [Narrator] But some of this framework, originally constructed in 1918, has been exposed, and is now ready for the new plating.

- This started back in 2003, and now seven years later, we're finally starting to see the beginning of the end, and it feels good.

- We're gonna try to pull up the plate on her today.

- [Narrator] The end of the repair work however, is not near.

Replating a boat takes time, especially a boat that's nearly a century old.

- We're gonna hang it up tight with the chain falls.

Then we'll take screw jacks and we'll go across the bottom, working the screw jacks, making sure it's tight against the bulkhead, then we'll weld it to the bulkhead.

- [Narrator] It's a process that's tedious.

- We're being a little bit careful.

We don't want to put no extra stress on any of the frames.

We'll be using extra jacks, extra chain falls.

It's a long process.

We'll have to keep moving those jacks pretty regularly to make sure it's right, keep it tight.

- I wish it was a little bit further along.

No, I think we're just a little bit behind, but I'm hoping to gain some ground here in the next few weeks.

- [Narrator] The entire process ends up taking roughly five months, and involves many delicate operations.

- The boat was supported on the dry dock with big blocks, roughly four feet square.

They were placed strategically so that we could replate number six, number four, and number two compartments, bottom and side.

And then the boat would have to be moved to place the blocks under the compartments that would then be replated, and then we could do five, three and one.

- [Narrator] So in order to move the blocks, crews could either refloat the boat, or lift the more than 340-ton boat off the ground.

- What we decided to do, was to lift the boat sideways, using three 40-foot, one-foot size I-beams, stretched along the bottom of the boat, the knuckle, the corner.

And then we had 10 100-ton jacks, that then lifted the boat up about three inches.

And then we could move the blocks, shift them, bring the boat down, and then go on the other side, lift that side up, and then shift those blocks.

- [Narrator] Any bonus renovation could also be completed.

The old tattered paddle wheel could be replaced.

- We had a donation of lumber for the paddle wheel, and we sorta had a contingency leftover for the hull.

So when we came right down to the end of it, we said, you know, we're up on the dry dock.

If we're gonna do it, now's the time to do it.

And we had just enough money to be able to go ahead and do the paddle wheel.

- [Narrator] The work to replace the hull, and put on a new paddle wheel was difficult, and took months longer than anyone expected.

But no one working on the boat forgot the goal, to get the Snyder back to Marietta, where her post on the Muskingum River was patiently waiting.

(acoustic guitar music) The sounds of crickets are all you can hear in the early morning hours of Friday, September 17th, 2010, near Marietta, Ohio.

It's calm and peaceful along the Ohio River on the day necessity created, the day the WP Snyder, Junior, is making the final leg of her trip home.

A big chance was taken with the WP Snyder to get her repaired, one that was almost too risky.

Hours earlier, it wasn't so peaceful on the river.

(thunder crashing) A storm ripped through the area, spawning tornadoes, and leaving destruction across the region.

(sirens blaring) The Snyder was making her way upriver from South Point when the storm hit.

And if she had stayed on schedule, the Snyder would have been right in the heart of the severe weather.

But something happened that crew members call a blessing in disguise, that took the Snyder off course.

- One of the deckhands came over and said, I think you need to look at the paddle wheel, because there's something that just doesn't look right.

- There's an arm going back to the paddle wheel that had somehow loosened up and let other things, you know, we didn't want to lose that 30-foot piece of pipe.

- [Narrator] So the Snyder pulled off at Ravenswood, West Virginia to weld the pipe to the boat.

It involved a couple hours of work.

- I walked up into town to get a couple pizzas for the guys, and we're sitting there in the pizza shop, and the Weather Channel was on, and they were showing this giant storm coming through.

I'm going, well Jiminy Christmas, that like right up river from us.

And, yeah, it's right up there.

So we came back, and Bill checked his cell phone and he said, oh yeah, we just missed this.

This just went like just upriver from us.

We were lucky.

We're lucky that this paddle wheel broke.

- Had we not stopped, we probably would have been right in the middle of it.

So we were blessed.

- Oh yeah, we probably would have got bank slammed there.

You know, with a lot of wind, I mean a lot of wind period, is hard to control.

So, you know, especially tornado conditions.

I'm sure it was the hand of God they're watching over us and, you know, taking care of us.

- [Narrator] With the near-miss behind her on the morning of the 17th, the waters of the Ohio River are once again calm and peaceful.

The Snyder is making her way slowly up the river on a mission to get home.

- When I open up the hatches and I look inside, and I see that beautiful inside of the hall.

I mean, people aren't gonna see it, but when I look in it, and I see that we've retained so much of the old work, the old riveted work, and it looks like 1955 inside that hull.

That's, you know, to me, that was what this project was about.

And she's in the water, she's not leaking.

And you know, I can really breathe a lot easier about that.

- [Narrator] As the morning light shines on the boat, it's like a light at the end of the tunnel for those who've been working on this project for years.

- And I want to get her back home, and I'll feel a lot better after all this time that she's back up at the River Museum.

- [Narrator] Back at the River Museum, people are getting ready to see the boat dock, hanging up decorations in preparation.

And they're wondering what she looks like, since the old girl got a new hull, a paddle wheel, and a bit of a cleaning job.

The people onboard the Valley Gem don't have to wait very long.

They get the home crowd's first look.

The Gem meets the Snyder as she approaches the confluence of the Ohio and Muskingum Rivers to welcome her back home.

The Snyder is almost there.

Just three bridges along the Muskingum River stand in her way.

Once the old Harmer Railroad Bridge has cranked open, the Snyder passes through without a problem.

(uptempo country music) Then she has to go under the Putnam Street Bridge.

And finally, she must find her way under the Washington Street Bridge, before she can safely pull into the place she's called home for the last 55 years.

(bell ringing) Fred Smith rings the bell as if allowing the boat to say, I'm home!

And it's in this moment, when the WP Snyder, Junior is back at her post on the Muskingum that Andy Verhoff can finally breathe that sigh of relief.

- Whew!

What a relief.

It's really gratifying to see the boat is back.

And of course, when we got on and I borrowed a flashlight from Jack Deck and started to look in the hull, all the parts that had rust in them are beautiful, clean, and now have the (indistinct), it has a new boat smell, or I should say a new hull smell.

I knew this day was gonna come, and I guess they say all good things come to those who wait.

So here we are with this good thing, the new hull under the WP Snyder, Junior.

- [Narrator] The new hull isn't the end of the Snyder's repair work.

More restoration is planned in the boat's future.

However, the hull, the boat's foundation, is the foundation for the rest of the work.

- [Andy] I'm glad we're still able to make history with the Snyder.

- [Narrator] Making history with a boat that now has a foundation for a bright future.

Ringing the bell two times is the riverboat signal for full steam ahead.

(bell ringing) Full steam ahead, WP Snyder, Junior.

(bell ringing) Full steam ahead.

(bright acoustic music)