Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 July 1875 — Two Niagara Heroes. [ARTICLE]

Two Niagara Heroes.

Joel Robinson, the <f navigator of the Niagara rapids.” who died some years since, was in many respects a remarkable man. Of stout frame and muscular make, he was retiring in his manners, and never courted the publicity into which his astonishing achievements brought him. He was at first a “guide" and then a jHiliceman at Niagara, and had become skillful in handling a boat by trips to the fishinggrounds about Navy Island,, above the tails. One day a man was discovered clinging to a small projection of rock iu the vety midst of the rapids, apparently inaccessible from the shore. A large crowd quickly gathered, Robinson among the rest. He studied the situation for a moment, then brought his boat to the spot, and putting right out into the headlong current gained the rock, took off the man, whose life had twenty minutes before seemed not worth a penny's purchase, and safely landed with him a"few rods above the brink of the fall. "A great concourse had by this time gathered on the bank, and Robinson's heroic exploit, witnessed with fear and amazement, was greeted with rounds of cheers. The boat with the two men in it was taken on the shoulders of several and carried about among the crowd, and contributions of money were willingly thrown into ft. For several veare after this Robinson exerted his peculiar skill in navigating the rapids, and snatched as many as" half a dozen castaways from the jaws of the cataract. ‘He was, personally, a most estimable man ; never, I believe, starting on his perilous journeys with the promise of reward, although very property accepting the small tokens of admiration for his daring which were offered him. How he managed to guide his skiff in that seething uproar of waters from point to point was always a mystery to everybody but himself. The mere task of keeping it keel downward and bow with the current is more than my reader or I would wish to undertake) to say nothing of calculating the course and the run of the rapids with such nicety as to land at a small islet.

Suc h cool heads and steady iron hands as those of Joel Robinson are rarely given to human kind\ Gallant fellow!—the world has few such, as you were; a real hero, in humble life though your lot was cast. No man ever better deserved the medal of the Humane Society', which was never offered him. I well remember the modest and characteristic reply lie made me in spring of 1804, after lie had' piloted the Maid of the Mist dow n through the whirlpool and the frightful rapids between Suspension Bridge and Lewiston, where steamboat, or indeed any boat whatever* had never passed before, and probably never will again. This fearful journey of a littleless than six miles was made in seventeen minutes, it being the only possible way of taking tlie little- steamer to Lake Ontario, w here- it was to lx- employed. I asked Robinson to tell me something about his novel and terrific trip. “lean only say,” lie replied, “ that I hung to the wheel, while- another man attended to the engine. Sometimes the boat was on her bottom and sometimes oh her side. Sometimes I had contro of her and sometimes she had contro of me. But I hung on and never let go the wheel.” “ Wasn’t you frightened V” “ Well, I declare I was so busy with the wheel, and the whole thing was over so quick, that I didn't think about Ix-ing •frightened. I suppose I should,haVe.been if 1 had had the time, for it was a pretty ugly place, now I tell you!" A young man named Conroy gained some tame, last summer, by his rescue of a castaway in the Canadian rapids by means of a rope with which lie was let down to the imperiled one, and which he fastened about his body, when both were hauled to the- hank by dozens of willing hands. Conroy is still at Niagara, add something more of this kind may lie- heard of him if occasion serves. Amid all the pettiness, fraud anil extortion that have been charged upon Niagara and its hucksters, it is pleasant and refreshing to read of such unselfish and brave acts as these. — Niagara Fall* Cor. N. Y. Times.