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Eureka is a side-wheel paddle
steamboat, built in 1890, which is now preserved at the San Francisco
Maritime National Historical Park. Originally named Ukiah to commemorate
the railway’s recent extension into the City of Ukiah, the boat was built by
the San Francisco and North Pacific Railroad Company at their Tiburon yard.
The
ship originally carried people between San Francisco and Tiburon during the day
and hauled railroad freight cars at night. Ukiah had two sets of
standard gauge tracks that ran the length of the main deck. Passenger
accommodations were on the upper deck.
During
the First World War, Ukiah was used to ferry heavy loads of railroad
cars across the bay for the United States Railroad Administration. Due to
stresses brought on by the heavy loads, Ukiah was rebuilt at the Southern
Pacific Yards in Oakland between 1920-1922, and emerged as the auto/passenger
ferry Eureka.
Between
1922 and 1941 Eureka was on the Sausalito commuter run, departing
Sausalito at 7:30 and San Francisco at 5:15. As a passenger ferry, she could
carry 2,300 passengers and 120 automobiles. At that time, she was the
biggest and the fastest double-ended passenger ferry boat in the world – 299 feet
6 inches long, with an extreme width of 78 feet and gross tonnage of 2,420
tons.
Completion
of the Golden Gate Bridge in 1937 doomed ferry service between San Francisco
and Marin and service was completely abandoned in 1941.
Although
a number of large ferryboats survive in the U.S., Eureka is the only one with
a wooden hull. Beneath
her upper works, the round-bottomed hull is 42 feet wide and 277 feet long. Her
walking beam engine was built in 1890 by the Fulton Iron Works in San Francisco.
It is the only walking beam engine in the United States preserved in a
floating vessel.
Eureka is the largest existing wooden
ship in the world.
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