NAPLES – On Saturday, spectators are expected to line the Naples

Causeway and Songo Lock to catch the final river cruise of the

Songo River Queen II, which afterward will be confined solely to

cruises around Long Lake.

NAPLES – The Songo River Queen had for 10 years been taking passengers on the snaking water bodies linking Long and Sebago lakes when, in the middle of the night of Oct. 1, 1980, it burned to the waterline while tied to the Songo Dock.

Frank Gerrish, the man behind the 65-foot-long riverboat replica, found himself debating his – and the boat’s – future, and doubting whether to rebuild. Then, a well-timed letter arrived at his home including a $1 donation from a 7-year-old girl whose parents were summer residents. The letter gave Gerrish all the motivation he needed.

“I got a lot of response from people when that all happened,” Gerrish, now 84, said last week. “But that $1 bill prompted me to make a go of it.”

Born that day was the Songo River Queen II, which for the past three decades has taken tourists and residents alike along the scenic cruise from Long Lake, through the Naples Causeway and on through the Songo Lock. Now, with the state’s construction of a fixed bridge along the causeway coming to an end, so, too, will the vessel’s usual run. On Saturday, spectators are expected to line the causeway and Songo Lock to catch the final river cruise of the Songo River Queen II, which afterward will be confined solely to cruises around Long Lake.

The Queen’s last ride through the river is bittersweet for local residents, who last week showed a range of emotions at the historic change.

Some, like Danielle Allen and her daughter, Jayme Allen, both longtime Naples residents, lament the decision to replace the swing bridge with a fixed bridge.

“I think it’s sad,” Danielle Allen said. “It’s a landmark of Naples and it’s been around for so many years. You’d think they could have made it so the bridge could have opened for just her. Something like that would have make sense.”

Others think the Queen and the town will do just fine, maybe better.

“I’m excited about the new look of the causeway, and I definitely won’t miss the bridge opening in the least,” said resident Bob Semple. “I’ve been on two cruises on the Queen – one on Long Lake and one of the Songo River. And I have to say I enjoyed the Long Lake cruise better. I liked the openness of the lake instead of the closeness of the river, especially on a hot, humid day. So I think it’s going to be just as good.”

While the boat’s owner, Kent Uicker, who has owned tour boats and marinas in Boston Harbor and Lake Winnipesaukee in the past, is likewise frustrated he will lose access to the Songo and historic lock, he said he intends to make the best of the situation and hopes future cruises on Long Lake will be a tourist draw.

“While I think it’s a great loss and a really bad move on the state’s part, my intent is to stay in business here and prosper here,” Uicker said.

A proud history

The Queen’s last run through the lock on Saturday comes after a long and proud presence in the heart of Naples.

Gerrish, a Naples fixture, was a commercial pilot flying corporate jets for a living back in 1969 when he saw a Mississippi paddlewheel gambling boat docked in Chicago during one of his trips. It was then he decided Naples, with the natural water paths connecting Long Lake and Sebago Lake, would make a good spot for a similarly large touring boat capable of carrying hundreds of passengers.

“I guess I had one too many drinks one Christmas and I think my big mouth got me in trouble,” Gerrish said in explaining how he posed the idea to his homebuilder cousin, Lloyd Cole of Kennebunk, who quickly got on board with the idea.

It didn’t take the two long to build a riverboat replica, with the Songo River Queen launching the following spring. The boat had nary a mishap, until the fire on that fateful night in October 1980.

“Everything was gone except for the hull,” Gerrish said. “We think it was someone who threw a cigarette butt in the rubbish that night.”

Gerrish turned the remnants of the original Queen into a dredging barge, which still exists and is docked at Port Harbor Marine in Raymond on Sebago Lake. Gerrish wondered about whether to rebuild, until the letter from the little girl arrived.

That little girl was Kristin Johnson, who is now 38-year-old Kristin Barclay, a married Boston lawyer with children of her own. She has fond memories of the Queen, since her family would travel from their Massachusetts home to Bridgton each weekend in the summer.

“When we saw the Queen we knew we were almost there,” Barclay remembered, when reached this week. “So it represented the area for us.”

Barclay also brought her future husband to the Queen on their first trip to Bridgton years ago and “he thought it was very neat, and our kids know the story as well,” she said. “It definitely is a big part of Naples and our connection to the area.”

Rebuilding

After securing financing from Casco Bank, Gerrish set out to recreate the Queen, this time bigger and better. Wanting to get back in business as soon as possible, work commenced immediately that winter, with much of the boat built directly on the ice of Brandy Pond.

“It was really cold, that’s what I remember. We had a lot of carpenters and it was really hard, stormy,” Gerrish said. “It was built half on the sand, half on the ice, and when the water came up in the spring, it just lifted it up. And we launched it for the first time on Mother’s Day, that would be 1981.”

The Songo River Queen II was 91 feet long and 21.5 feet wide, custom designed by Gerrish’s friend, Freemont Merriam, to squeak through the Songo Lock.

“There’s only a couple inches’ clearance on both sides. It’s designed that way though,” Gerrish said.

The new boat was all wood, and was paddlewheel driven, like the former Queen.

“People think it has a propeller, but it doesn’t, except for a bow thruster which helps it turn around,” Gerrish said. “The engine drives the paddlewheel, and that propels the boat along, just like a real riverboat.”

Gerrish said he didn’t get rich owning the Queen, but he has earned world-renown, proven, ironically, on a Caribbean cruise with his wife.

“You know how you sit with different people for meals on a cruise?” Gerrish said. “Well, we were sitting with a couple trying to describe where Naples, Maine was and I said it’s halfway between Portland and the White Mountains, and they knew right where it was because of the boat, which I told them I owned.

“So it’s a small world. People from all over have heard of the Songo River Queen.”

Saturday’s cruise

According to Ron Turciak, a longtime Queen driver who will be at the helm along with owner Kent Uicker and possibly Gerrish, the Queen is set for one last Songo hurrah this Saturday, when many are expected to line up to either ride on the boat or witness from shore the boat’s historic cruise.

The Queen leaves its dock on the Naples Causeway at 1:45 p.m. for its usual Songo River cruise. After turning around on the Sebago Lake side of the lock, the Queen will make its last return trip up the Songo, passing into Brandy Pond where a flotilla of boats led by the Naples harbormaster will meet the Queen at about 3:30 p.m.

The flotilla will lead the Queen across Brandy Pond to the Bay of Naples Bridge where, with spectators looking on from the Causeway, the flotilla will cross one by one through the Chute River, the world’s shortest river, beginning at 4 p.m. when the bridge opens for the last time.

Once each boat in the flotilla is through, the Queen will follow with a Maine Marine Patrol boat monitoring from behind, making sure the Queen is in fact the last boat to cross through the bridge.

“And that’ll be it. That is the last opening of the bridge,” said Jim Allen, owner of Naples Marina and an organizer of the flotilla, which is open to all participants. “If a boat goes through in the flotilla that’s not able to get back under the closed bridge, it’s stuck on the other side, because the Queen’s the last boat through before they close it up.”

“It’s going to be festive, yet dignified,” Uicker said of the last cruise. “More ceremonial than anything, with the Queen being the last boat through the bridge, which is the way it should be.”

Frank Gerrish, original owner of the Songo River Queen; his
wife, Diana; Ron Terciak, the ship’s captain; Kent Uicker, its
current owner; and Fremont Merriam, the boat’s designer, stand
along the rail of the Songo River Queen II last week in Naples. The
riverboat replica will make its last trip down the Songo River on
Saturday, after which it will be confined to cruises across Long
Lake. (Photo by Rich Obrey)
Dianna and Frank Gerrish, original owner of both versions of the
Songo River Queen. (Photo by Rich Obrey)