California Transportation Company

The California Transportation Company was originally formed in 1875, and operated a fleet of small steamers that stopped at all farmers' landings along the Sacramento River to pick up freight - a far cry from the big river steamboats of the time, which only stopped at Sacramento, Rio Vista and Benicia. The company also operated two large steamboats, the S. M. Whipple and the calliope bearing Chin-Du-Wan. These steamboats stopped at all landings between Rio Vista and Clarksburg. This could mean as many as sixty-five different landings on a single trip. The lower Sacramento had as many as two hundred landings - some were substantial constructions with pilings and heavy timbers, while many were nothing more than piles of brush made by a single farmer.

Over the years, the company became one of the largest operators on the river, operating a fleet of ships that included:

• Yosemite
• Chrysopolis
• Capital City
• Julia
• Amador
• Sacramento
• Onsibo
• Isleton
• Delta Queen
• Delta King
• Fort Sutter
• Pride of the River

The company owned a ship yard on Wood Island off Rio Vista, and in 1904 purchased the Union Transportation Company of Sacramento - which signaled the company's serious entry into passenger service.

In 1907, the company began to occupy a prominent location at the new City Wharf in Sacramento at the foot of M Street (Capitol Avenue) and began to offer through passenger and freight service betwen Sacramento and San Francisco.

The company's zenith of freight and passenger service occured in the mid-1910's, but rail, automotive and trucking advances started eating away at profits soon there after. In 1927, the company reorganized under the same name, and five years later it merged with the Sacramento Navigation Company and the Fay Transportation Company.