Tug Boat Life

Having grown up on a farm in Skagit Valley, Captain Gerald (aka “Jerry”) Bell graduated from La Conner High School in 1958. He currently resides in Western Washington. Hired by Dunlap Towing in 1959, Jerry worked the next 50 years on tugboats. He spent the first ten years working his way from deckhand to mate and then from mate to part time captain. Once promoted to captain, Jerry continued to work another 40 years at that position. He has worked almost every inch of the Pacific Coast, (including inlets, bays, harbors and rivers) from Ketchikan, Alaska to Los Angeles, California. 1959 to 1969 were spent towing logs, gravel barges and freight barges for Dunlap Towing. After that time (1970 to 1998), the next twenty-eight years were spent towing freight barges for Puget Sound Freight Lines. When Puget Sound Freight Lines went out of business in 1998, Jerry was forced to transition to towing oil barges for the next six years at Olympic Tug and Barge (1998 to 2004). The final six years of his career (2004 to 2010) were spent at Pacific Northwest Marine Services where he towed scrap metal barges between the Fraser River in British Columbia, Canada and Tacoma, Washington. He included some history along with sea stories and a scattering of humor. Jerry retired in December of 2010 and began to write his Memoir on January 18th, 2011.