Waterfront information board, with 1880s cargo handling photograph, Donkey Engine exhibit, Hyde Street Pier, San Francisco, USA

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This Steam Donkey Engine information board, at the Hyde Street waterfront, reads: 'Donkey engines like this one were common along the waterfront from the 1880s into the 1920s. These portable steam winches were used as auxiliary power for loading and unloading cargo. The name 'donkey' comes from the fact that the engines replaced horses as a power source for cargo handling. The term was also applied to similar engine and boiler units carried aboard ship. Donkey engines were also employed in construction work, and in industries such as lumbering and mining. This engine was used until 1968 aboard a derrick barge belonging to the Port of Oakland.' The photograph shows Green Street Wharf, San Francisco, in the 1880s, with two donkey engines in operation. The diagram illustrates a Murray Brothers marine donkey engine, a type favoured on the West Coast during the late 19th Century. The Basic Facts, lower left, inform that the steam donkey engine displayed at Hyde Street, next to the sternwheel of the ferryboat 'Petaluma', was built, about 1920, by the American Hoist and Derrick Company, at St Paul, Minnesota. The engine type is a two cylinder horizontal and the winch type a double friction drum.

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Size: 5472px × 3648px
Location: Steam Donkey Engine, Hyde Street Pier, San Francisco, California, USA
Photo credit: © robert harrison / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No

Keywords: 1880s, board, california, cargo, donkey, engine, exhibit, fisherman, francisco, handling, history, hyde, information, maritime, monochrome, museum, national, park, photograph, pier, sailing, san, ships, steam, street, usa, waterfront, wharf