Elmer E. Chapin

Elmer E. Chapin was born September 27, 1860, at East Otto, Montgomery Co., N.Y., and received his education in the common schools of Buffalo, to which city his parents removed soon after his birth. He is the son of Rev. Lucius, a minister in the Methodist Church and Sophia Chapin, who were American born, and in the early days were known as "Down East Yankees," both being born in the State of Vermont, and on the father's side the family is descended from Ethan Allen. Rev. Lucius Chapin was a minister in the Methodist Church.

The first experience of our subject in connection with the lakes was, though nothing but a school boy, in the capacity of a deck hand or line man on the tug Newsboy, of Buffalo harbor. After leaving this employ he spent two years in the machine shops, learning the trade of machinist, which he subsequently followed. His first boat was the tug Iron Bridge; then the Newsboy for two or three seasons. His next employment was as chief engineer in the tug Fulton, where he remained one season, and then returned to the Newsboy in the same capacity, remaining in her until she was remodeled and her name changed to the Leo Lennox. The next service he engaged in was with the New York Central Railroad Company, on its Western division, for which company he acted as fireman eleven years and engineer two years, and then, in June 1891, he came to his present position, that of chief engineer of the Exchange Elevator. Mr. Chapin was a member of the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen for eight or nine years, and for eight or nine has a member of the Marine Engineers Beneficial Association; for the past two years has been a member of the Ancient Order of United Workmen.

Mr. Chapin was granted a license as engineer at the age of eighteen years, and was one of the youngest engineers in the harbor.

On July 1, 1885, Mr. Chapin was married to Nelly C. Kirkland, daughter of Gilbert C. Kirkland, formerly of Rochester, N.Y. To this union have come children as follows: Harry E., Jennie (deceased) and Gilbert.

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Volume I

This version of Volume II is based, with permission, on the work of the great volunteers at the Marine Captains Biographies site. To them goes the credit for reorganizing the content into some coherent order. The biographies in the original volume are in essentially random order.

Some of the transcription work was also done by Brendon Baillod, who maintains an excellent guide to Great Lakes Shipwreck Research.