Steamer Chaperon

History of the Chaperon

The Chaperon was originally built in 1884 in Chambersburg, Ohio, and was named the J. C. Kerr. The boat was 120 feet long, 21 feet wide and 4 feet deep. It was used as a commercial vessel in Kentucky on the Green River in the early 1890s. In 1904, the boat was renamed the Chaperon and was used for a short time on trade routes and for excursions between Bowling Green and Mammoth Cave.

A postcard from 1910 shows the steamboat Chaperon docked at a pier. With hundreds of passengers on the Green River to visit one of the great wonders of the world - Mammoth Cave. Women in long white dresses and men in boat caps, straw hats hanging from the boat's railing. People bustle around on the quay, excitedly awaiting their trip to the longest cave in the world. Previous visitors had regaled them with tales of the "horrific spectacle" of the cave's "underworld", from which strange odours and eerie winds would emanate.

In 1906, just a few years before the photo of the steamboat Chaperon was taken, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers had constructed Green River Lock and Dam 6 at a site nearly 300 kilometres from the confluence of the Green River with the Ohio River and just downstream from Mammoth Cave. Steamboats had been navigating the Ohio since 1811, but it wasn't until Lock and Dam 6 that large boats were able to reliably navigate the shell-grown shallows of the Ohio. The Chaperon was the first boat of its kind to pass through the new locks. These locks increased trade on the Green River. The Evansville & Bowling Green Packet Company offered an "All River Excursion Route to Mammoth Cave" during the summer months with the steamboat Chaperon. The ship was sold shortly before World War I and then taken to the Mississippi River, where she was named Choctaw. She sailed on the Tallahatchie River until 1922, when she burned down.

The Chaperon is an interesting ship and an excellent model. The model is well suited for beginners in ship modelling. In 1:48 scale, it is easy to build and contains many precise details. The hull construction in frame construction with laser-cut parts offers fast construction. It ensures an accurate hull shape consisting of interlocking, self-aligning parts. The kit contains all the necessary fittings in Britannia, brass and wood. Some parts need to be reworked before they are suitable for the model. This is especially true for the cast metal parts. Five large-format plans are included. The plans are in isometric form which makes it easier to identify parts and their arrangement. An additional sheet 6 shows etched brass parts and identifies important features of the parts and their designations. The instructions are in English - a simple translation of the instructions is included with the kit. Limewood mouldings and laser-cut panels are included in the kit.

Conversion to a floatable model is basically possible but not described.

We supply a translation of the English instructions into German - not quite perfect but very easy to understand.

Technical data
Scale: M 1:48
Length: 876 mm
Width: 191 mm