The Day Peckinpaugh is a 1921 historic canal motorship owned by the New York State Museum as a traveling museum and classroom dedicated to sharing New York’s world renowned canal history.
 
Fast Facts
 

• Carrying capacity: 1650 tons, five times larger the largest wooden mule-towed boats of the 1800s.
   
• Dimensions: 259 feet long and 36 feet wide; 14 feet depth of hold; among the largest boats to operate on New York’s canal system (maximum area available for vessels in a lock on the canal is 300 feet long by 43.5 feet wide)
   
• First and Last: First vessel designed specifically for the dimensions of the Barge Canal and the last surviving vessel of her kind
   
• Maximum Speed: 6-8 miles per hour
   
• Power: diesel, originally two 4-cylinder Scandia engines, now a pair of GM 6-110s
   
• Cargo: wheat, flax seed, rye, sugar, coal and pig iron (early years), dry cement (1958-94)
   
• Transportation Corridor: Great Lakes to New York Harbor
   
• Military Service: Drafted into service of the U.S. Merchant Marine during World War II to carry coal and refuel cargo ships along the eastern seaboard
   
• Names: Originally launched as the Interwaterways Line 101 (I.W.I. 101), renamed Richard J. Barnes in 1922 for the man who originally commissioned the ship, renamed Day Peckinpaugh in 1958 by new owners.
   
• Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, 2005

 
Rescued from the scrapyard in 2005, the Day Peckinpaugh’s restoration is a joint effort of the museum, Erie Canalway National Heritage Corridor, New York State Canal Corporation, Canal Society of NYS, and the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation.