Sabino: Oldest Coal-Fired Steamboat Still Running

Moored at Mystic Seaport, the Sabino is the oldest coal-fired passenger steamboat still operating in the United States. She was built in East Boothbay, Maine, in nineteen oh eight as the Tourist, carrying passengers on the Damariscotta River. From nineteen twenty-seven to nineteen fifty-eight she carried passengers among the islands of Casco Bay.

Mystic Seaport leased her in nineteen seventy-four and then bought her. On summer evenings she still makes runs up the Mystic River, her steam whistle echoing off the salt marshes, burning the same anthracite coal she always has. She is a National Historic Landmark, one of only a handful of vessels that can claim both that honor and the ability to actually get underway under her own power.