Puffing Race

When the packets Tom Greene and Betsy Ann raced on the Ohio river last year (TIME, July 29) the little Betsy Ann was the second to reach the finish line but the first entirely across it. That started an argument which could not be settled until, last week, they lined up again, their engines roaring and their stovepipe smokestacks belching smoke black as ink, 50 ft. behind the starting line at Fernbank dam, twelve miles below Cincinnati. A small cannon boomed; both started for the line, the Tom Greene accelerating with the quick pick-up that has made river-people call her "Hopping Tom." Nailed firmly on the front of the wheelhouse of the ''Hopping Tom," where stood young Capt. Tom Greene himself, were the gilded antlers that go to the "fastest packet on the Ohio river." From the wheelhouse of the Betsy Ann peered Capt. Fred Way Jr. who had said: "Those antlers belong on the Betsy Ann and that's where they are going."

At Constance, Ky. the calliope of the showboat Bryant of Marietta soughed squealingly "Beautiful Ohio" and then the Betsy Ann's tune, "Dixie." The Tom Greene had an edge, but the boats were still so close together that the resting shifts of black stokers jibed at each other across the dividing strip of foamy yellow-brown water. Coming into Cincinnati, special policemen sweated to keep order in the dense auto lines of spectators along the river side streets. Here the Tom Greene began to pull away, was a half-mile ahead just past the city and finished the 21 mi. course at Coney Island with the Betsy Ann out of sight around the bend behind.

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