The End of Her Reign?

Neon Memes • The website of the ship's owner, Seattle's Majestic America Line, enumerates several salient details: guest capacity, 174; crew, 80; staterooms, 88; public rooms, five; length, 285 feet; width, 60 feet. Yet because they short romance, those numbers provide little real insight into the Delta Queen. "Built in 1926," states the MAL site, "Delta Queen is registered as a National Historic Landmark and is the last operational overnight steam-powered sternwheeler in the United States." Unfortunately, its life on the Mississippi may have ended a week ago. To continue plying the river, the steamboat needs the latest in a four-decade series of exemptions from the federal Safety at Sea Act―but Rep. James L. Oberstar (D–Minn.), who chairs the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, reportedly opposes another exemption on safety grounds. (His opponents in the matter claim political reasons.) From my days tending bar in southeast Missouri at Port Cape Girardeau on the riverside in the mid-'80s, I fondly recall the Delta Queen, its scarlet paddlewheel frothing the waters, its calliope piping merrily. I hope grass-roots efforts to save the ship succeed. It would be a shame to contemplate the grand old dame forevermore dry-docked in New Orleans. ―Bryan A. Hollerbach, Managing Editor