[Judy Patsch]

I started a new topic because we've strayed far afield from the title in which Keith's quote appeared:
"After the Howard Steamboat Museum burned in March of 1971, I fished the "speaker" part from a destroyed Victrola out of the rubble that had been dumped in the side yard. Knowing Doc's penchant for megaphones, I took it down to the BELLE, where the "relic" was promptly taken to the paint locker on the wharfboat RENOWN, cleaned up (a surprise was in discovering that the bottom portion is brass) and painted. Doc painted a flowing red ribbon down the side and lettered STEAMER BELLE OF LOUISVILLE in fancy lettering upon it. He used the megaphone until he left the BELLE following the 1974 season to assume command of the new steamer NATCHEZ at New Orleans. I took the artifact home and it resides in my River Room. Once when Ruth Ferris was visiting she enjoyed shouting commands through it that she'd heard Capt. Buck Leyhe use on the Str. GOLDEN EAGLE!"
Here is a picture Keith took of Doc with that megaphone on the BELLE. The second picture Keith took on the NATCHEZ in 1982 in the same location, same Captain, not-so-fancy megaphone. This is the megaphone I have sitting next to me. They were using a brass one on the trip up to the Louisville race, but someone forgot to fasten it to the post and a windstorm in Natchez Mississippi deposited it into Ol Miss, so this old one was put back into use.