Captain Frank McCabe

Captain Frank McCabe, master of the steamer Chicago, of the Western Transit Company, Buffalo, N.Y., is a native of that city, having been born there October 24, 1845. Patrick McCabe, father of our subject, was born in the North of Ireland, and about the year 1834 left Dublin for the United States, coming direct to Buffalo. For a time he was fireman on the lakes, and then entered the employ of Bidwell & Banty, shipbuilders, with whom he remained some thirty years. By his wife Catherine McCabe, also a native of the North of Ireland, and whom he had married in that country, he had children as follows: Michael (who was mate of the schooner Metropolis, and was drowned off her in 1864), Joseph (who was an elevator man), Frank J., Elizabeth (deceased), and Mary (wife of Owen Gologly).

Our subject received his education in School No. 4, Buffalo, N.Y., and from the time he was twelve years old until he was twenty he attended night school only, during the winter seasons. In 1858 he commenced sailing the lakes, at first in the capacity of cabin boy on the steamer Iowa, Capt. Robert Jones, from which humble position he worked his way up, entirely by his own exertions and merit until by the year 1869 we find him master of the schooner Wat Sherman. In 1872 he left sailing vessels for steamships, in that year becoming captain of the tug Evans, of Chicago, and in 1873 he was mate of the Camden. In 1874 he served on the harbor police force of Buffalo; in 1875 he was mate of the steamer Java, one of the Commercial line of vessels, in the latter year entering the service of the Western Transit Company, being mate for two years, and master of the Chicago (his present position) for some eight years, or up to this writing. In point of service he is one of the oldest captains at present in the employ of that company, and in his lake career he has been both successful and fortunate, never having experienced collision, shipwreck or cast-away. On December 21, 1868, Captain McCabe was married to Miss Mary Murphy, daughter of the late Joseph and Elizabeth Murphy, and three children have been born to them: Mary, Elizabeth and Frank. The family residence is No. 393 Elk street, Buffalo.

Captain McCabe has always taken an active interest in marine matters, and in 1890 he united with the Ship Masters Association, of which he was president in 1896; in which year, and also in 1897, he was a delegate to the Shipmasters convention. Socially he is affiliated with the Catholic Mutual Benefit Association, Branch No. 8.

Return to Home Port

Volume I

This version of Volume II is based, with permission, on the work of the great volunteers at the Marine Captains Biographies site. To them goes the credit for reorganizing the content into some coherent order. The biographies in the original volume are in essentially random order.

Some of the transcription work was also done by Brendon Baillod, who maintains an excellent guide to Great Lakes Shipwreck Research.