Frank Clayton Upper

Frank Clayton Upper, engineer of the tug Acme, from early manhood has been in active service on the lakes. He was born in Rockford, Ont., April 3, 1866, a son of F.G. and Sarah (Brady) Upper, the former of whom was of Scotch-English descent, the latter of Irish-German. The father is a contractor and builder by trade and occupation, and is a resident of Niagara Falls.

Our subject came to Buffalo at the age of thirteen years, so that his education was obtained at the public schools of both his native town and Buffalo. At the age of seventeen years he began his life on the lakes as fireman of the tug Holloway, of Buffalo, in which capacity he served for four years. He then shipped for one year on the steamyacht Sappho, sailing on the Lake Champlain, and in 1887 he received his papers as second engineer and first assistant on the lakes. The following year he became engineer of the tug Page, of Fairport, Ohio, and sailed in her for one season, next shipping on the tug Annie, of the same port, on which he served as first engineer for four years. In 1893-94 he worked ashore about the docks of Buffalo, and in 1895 he was engineer of the tug Kilderhouse, of Matham's line, for one season, and in 1896-97 being engineer of the tug Acme, of the same line. In 1898 he was made engineer of the tug Fabian, the principal tug of that line in the harbor. Mr. Upper has been very successful as an engineer.

Mr. Upper was married December 24, 1890, to Miss Clara Boyer, of Buffalo, N.Y., and they reside at No. 398 Summer street, in that city. In fraternal connection he is a member of Aurora Borealis Lodge No. 642, I.O.O.F., and of Blazing Star No. 694, F.& A.M., since 1892.

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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.