Founded initially in 1838 to work towards the "better security of the lives of passengers on board vessels propelled in whole or in part by steam" the Steamboat Inspection Service had been placed on an organized footing in 1852 by act of Congress. The President of the United States appointed nine supervising inspectors who would meet together as well as supervise and carry out inspections on craft in territories assigned to them. In 1859, for example, John Shalcross of Louisville, Kentucky covered vessels plying the waters of the Ohio River up to the Kentucky River while O.A. Pitfield of New Orleans was responsible for the Mississippi up to Baton Rouge, as well as California and Oregon. Pitfield, for one, must have been grateful that in addition to an annual salary for inspectors of $1,500, travel expenses were also paid. (By John Osborne)
Lloyd Milton Short, Steamboat-Inspection Service: Its History, Activities and Organization (New York: D. Appleton and Company, 1922), 4-5.
The American Almanac and Repository of Useful Knowledge for the Year 1860 (Boston: Crosby, Nichols, and Company, 1860) , 101.