John Bonser (steamship captain)

John Henry Bonser (1855-1913) was a steamship captain from Oregon, United States and British Columbia, Canada.

John was born in 1855 at Sauvie Island near the banks of the Columbia River in Oregon, the second son of James Halstead Bonser.

Riverboating was a tradition in the Bonser family, as both John's father and grandfather had been rivermen on the Scioto and Ohio rivers.

[1] In 1871, when John was 16, he and his older brother, Thomas Albert Bonser, left home and began working on riverboats on the Cowlitz, Lewis and Columbia rivers, doing everything from piloting the crafts to cooking in the galleys.

Ida would take the wheel if John was called away on an emergency and provided nursing care to sick or injured passengers and crew.

Part of Odin's letter read, "We understand that you have the reputation of not being afraid to take a steamboat over Niagara Falls, across the Sahara Desert or from hell to breakfast.

A business rival of the Hudson's Bay Company, Robert Cunningham, bought the Monte Cristo and hired Captain Bonser away from the HBC to pilot it.

Captain Bonser started out in the Hazelton first, and while he was wooding-up 105 miles upstream, he saw the Mount Royal with Johnson at the helm coming up from behind.

Bonser wagged the Hazelton’s stern at the Mount Royal, tooted the whistle and continued triumphantly upstream.

The Federal Department of Marine investigated and decided that both captains were at fault, Bonser for ramming the Mount Royal, and Johnson for leaving the helm.

The new arrangements between the HBC and Robert Cunningham left Captain Bonser without a vessel until 1906 when he took command of the Pheasant, a small sternwheeler that was the butt of many jokes and nicknamed the "Chicken" because it had to scratch so hard to get upstream.

In response to this minor crisis, the HBC refitted the Caledonia and she ran an emergency trip up the Skeena with the much desired supplies.

Then, that August, the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway line was finished to form Prince Rupert to Hazelton, a death knell for the local sternwheelers.