The Duluth Evening Herald - September 15, 1909: The freighter SIERRA of the G. A. Tomlinson Fleet is the first Duluth boat to install and use wireless telegraphy, having just completed a trip to Conneaut, Ohio, during which the apparatus worked admirably and the experiment will probably lead to the installation of the apparatus on all Tomlinson boats, as well as others sailing from this port. While the use of the wireless on the SIERRA this trip was only an experiment, it worked out so well that if further tests are as satisfactory, it will be generally utilized. The SIERRA sails from Conneaut, on the return trip to Duluth this afternoon and if the receiving tower on the hill here is in working order tests will be made in communicating with Duluth. When the SIERRA left Two Harbors on the night of Sept. 9, the apparatus was aboard but it was not perfected until after the boat passed the Soo. At midnight on Sept. 11, while in Lake Huron, off Alpena, Mich., the SIERRA picked up Milwaukee, exchanged messages; at 1 o'clock picked up Chicago and later Mr. Tomlinson's offices in Cleveland. The SIERRA is in command of Capt. Harold Davidson, well known in Duluth, and while off Port Huron, he talked with friends in the Waldorf-Astoria hotel, New York City. The United wireless station in New York is located on the roof of the Waldorf. He also talked with Port Huron. While five miles out of Conneaut, waiting for a turn at the docks in that port, the SIERRA was in constant communication with the Tomlinson office in Cleveland. A number of boats were waiting their turns at the docks there. Usually a tug goes out to instruct the captains as to which docks to go to but this trip, Capt. Davidson received his dock orders direct from the Cleveland office by wireless. Vessel men are anxious to know how the wireless apparatus will work in the dense fogs, which fall over Lake Superior from time to time. If the Duluth receiving station is in readiness and fogs are encountered, the SIERRA will make this test upon her return trip. Vessel men are watching the wireless experiments on the lakes with great interest. So far as the SIERRA'S work on this last trip is concerned, it seems immensely satisfactory and practicable to them. --------------------------------------------- The Duluth Herald - July 22, 1911: Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan (Special to the Herald) - General Manager Holton of the Northern Navigation Company announced here this morning that the company would erect a wireless station here within the next two months. He also announced that wireless outfits and operators would be placed on the steamers HURONIC, HARMONIC, SARONIC, MAJESTIC, GERMANIC, and CITY OF MIDKAND as soon as the station had been installed here and that the Anchor line and C.P.R. boats would also probably follow suit. ------------------------------------------- The above are from the November 2009 and July 2011 issues of The Detroit Marine Historian - the Journal of the Marine Historical Society of Detroit - http://www.mhsd.org. Used with their permission.