Wissahickon, 1904
The name, Wissahickon, comes from the Lenni Lenape tribe of the Native Americans living in the Delaware Valley in pre-colonial times. Their use of the words "Wisaucksickan" ("yellow-colored creek") and "Wisamickan" ("catfish creek") evolved into the contemporary word Wissahickon. Also a small stream in southeastern Pennsylvania which rises in Montgomery County near Lansdale and flows south some 40 miles to empty into the Schuylkill River in Philadelphia.
Builder: Spedden Company, Baltimore, Maryland
Length: 96' 6"
Beam: 20' 6"
Draft: 9'
Displacement: 182 tons
Cost: $69,800
Commissioned: 3 December 1904
Decommissioned: 8 May 1935
Disposition: Sold
Machinery: Reciprocating steam engine; 1 Babcock & Wilcox watertube boiler; 500 SHP; single propeller
Performance & Endurance:
Max: 12.0 knots
Cruising: 10.0 knots; 680 mile range (1945)
Complement: 11 (1945)
Armament: None
Electronics: None
Cutter History:
Wissahickon was a 182-ton, 96' 6"-foot harbor tug, one of two Winnisimmet-class tugs built by the Spedden Company in Baltimore, Maryland, the other being Winnisimmet. Wissahickon was launched on 11 June 1904 and was commissioned on 3 December 1904. She was first assigned to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania before being transferred to Baltimore in 1916. She was transferred to Navy control on 6 April 1917 and was returned to Treasury Department control on 28 August 1919. On 1 January 1923 she was transferred to New York harbor, where she remained in service until she was decommissioned on 8 May 1935.
Sources:
Donald Canney. U.S. Coast Guard and Revenue Cutters, 1790-1935. Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1995.
U.S. Coast Guard. Record of Movements: Vessels of the United States Coast Guard: 1790 - December 31, 1933. Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1934; 1989 (reprint).