Wheelhouse moved to final home

Several local interested residents along with some visitors to Port Burwell watched as the George Barnes Memorial Wheelhouse was moved from the bottom of Pitt Street by the flats next to Otter Creek about 100 metres (328 feet) up the hill and across the intersection at Robinson Street to its final home in front of the Marine Museum on Friday, July 20. Workers with Warne Construction of Blenheim completed the task using specialized equipment including a transport truck fitted with gears for heavy hauling. The move started shortly before 11 a.m. that day and took a few hours. The workers broke off the job to have lunch after the wheelhouse was positioned in front of the concrete pad directly in front of the museum which will be the exhibit’s permanent resting place. The interior restoration of the wheelhouse is expected to take several more months. The wooden two-storey wheelhouse was the navigational control room on the Fernglen, a large ship that sailed the Great Lakes for almost 70 years. The structure’s name recognizes the patriarch of the family that donated the wheelhouse to the Port Burwell Historical Society. (AE/Craig Bradford)