Chicago Tribune du lieu suivant : Chicago, Illinois • 256

Section 11 (Chicago (Triilttne Sunday, May 2, 1982 I I. it it 1: i- 6 5 if -s Alfred Dorcovcr Hail to Capt. Betty, the riverboat queen ABOUT 12 YEARS AGO, wonderful dice of Americana was about to be grounded. The Delta Queen, last of the sternwheelers carrying passengers overnight on the Ohio and Mississippi rivers, was in the process of being -drydocked by federal bureaucracy. The House Merchant Marine and Fisheries Commit-tee, then headed by Rep.

Edward A. Garmatz had rejected the pleas of riverboat romantics and insisted that the Delta Queen must adhere to the 1966 Safety at Sea Law. That law requires that any vessel carrying more than SO passengers overnight be constructed entirely of steel. The law was enacted after a 1964 fire aboard the Yarmouth Castle claimed 80 lives as the ship cruised between Miami and Nassau. The Delta Queen's hull was steel, but its superstructure and handsome interior were wood Oregon cedar, oak, ma-.

hogany, teak, walnut and ironwood. Several times after the passage of the law the Delta Queen was granted exemptions. Despite pleas by congressional members from 17 states bordering the rivers, from preservationists and others who loved the riverboat nostalgia, the Maritime Committee deemed that the Delta Queen was unsafe to ply the rivers. THE OWNERS of the Delta Queen, Greene Line based in Cincinnati, were determined to save the Delta -Queen. No one was more determined than the line's young public relations director, Betty Blake.

Blake had grown up in central Kentucky and had her first taste of campaigning at age 5, when she went door-faHloor working for her father's election to the state legislature. She seemed to have had the magic touch, because her father served six terms. She went on to the University of Kentucky where she was graduated in business administration. After several jobs, one with the Avalon, later renamed Belle of Louisville, she was appointed public relations director of Greene Line. There was an instant love affair between Blake and the rivers and the boat.

After the Safety at Sea Law was enacted, and the Delta Queen's life on the river was imperiled, Blake hit the campaign trail once more. The Delta Queen was her cause. She argued that the Delta Queen, whose steel hull was constructed in 1926 on Scotland's Clydesbank, where the old Queen Mary was built, never went to sea and therefore should not be classed as an ocean-going vessel. The Delta Queen is 285 feet long, 58 feet wide and can carry 192 passengers and a crew of 75. NEVER MIND that the Delta Queen was staffed with government-licensed pilots with decades of experience, was manned around the clock, had radar, depth-finding gear, radios and ship-to-shore telephones.

Garmatz and his committee were determined to take the Delta Queen out of the passenger business. But the Maritime Committee, had not met the likes of Betty Blake. She cajoled, lobbied and in her own charming but persuasive ways, won a lot of friends. One of her first allies was Rep. Lenor K.

Sullivan a member and later chairman of the Maritime Committee. Others joined the bandwagon as the Delta Queen's calliope echoed along the river banks. At one committee hearing, Garmatz was quoted as saying, "Lenore, you can't have the Delta Queen anymore." But in 1970 the House. Judiciary Committee voted out a bill with a Delta Queen exemption tacked on. The bill reached the House floor, won and was signed into law, giving the Delta Queen a reprieve until 1973.

Blake had not lost her campaign touch. Additional extensions were won; the most recent was last year which Is good through 1988. IN THE MEANTIME, the Delta Queen had to undergo a lot of surgery to keep it afloat, the boat went into drydock In 1971 to get new steel plates and hull sections and a new diesel electric power plant. Its rooms were coated with heat shield protective material developed for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and equipped with a sprinkler system. An automatic fire detection system also was installed.

The initial renovation cost about (150,000, although more than $5 million has been spent to date. In 1973 Greene Line was sold to Overseas National Airways, which eventually changed the company's name to the Delta Queen Steamboat Co. With the changes came promotions for Blake. She became executive vice president in 1974 and president a year later. Work had begun on the $27.5 million Mississippi Queen, the Delta Queen's younger but bigger sister, which hit the river in 1976.

(See page 9 for a story on cruising aboard the Mississippi Queen. By this time Blake was affectionately known as Captain Betty. Coca-Cola of New York purchased the company in 1976 and Blake remained as president. She had become synonymous with the Queens. IN 1979, THERE was a parting of the ways.

Blake had not lost her love for the boats or for the rivers, but she was always In search of a new challenge, even new risks. She started her own firm, Betty Blake at to do public relations and marketing consulting. Even a little paddlewheeler was named for her. The Betty Blake is used for excursions on the Ohio River out of Cincinnati. About a year ago, Blake was talking about a riverboat revival with a lot of little Betty Blakes plying rivers everywhere.

Always the optimist, she was her own Daniel Bumham and made no little plans. Last Christmas Eve, however, Blake became ill. She entered hospital In Cincinnati and subsequently was moved to Sloan-Kettering Memorial Hospital In New York. Blake knew she was in for a tough fight, but she felt she would win because she had a lot of friends behind her, helping her fight her fight as best they could. It had always, been that way.

Blake never lacked supporters. As you might have guessed by now, Betty lost her taut campaign. She died April 13 of cancer at the home of relatives In Georgetown, Ky. She was 51. Her successful fight to save the Delta Queen will long be remembered.

And passengers who happen to cruise the Ohio or Mississippi rivers on the Delta Queen this season might want to thank and toast Captain Betty tor keeping the boat alive. She would have liked that a lot. JAW-) lM Oram nn iiu Knoxville World's Fair opens for a six-month run. Page 7 Mississippi; Page 9 mjghty Stearrtboatin'' magic on the Charles, Diana-move into mansion fit for a king. Page 12 Caveman at: Undergrpundbeauty in France.

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