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This article is about the water vessel. For the Chinese meal or Colorado ski resort, see Chinese Steamboat or Steamboat Ski Resort, respectively. A steamboat or steamship, sometimes called a steamer, is a boat or vessel which is propelled by steam power that drives a propeller or paddlewheel. The term steamboat is usually used to refer to smaller steam-powered boats working on lakes and rivers, particularly riverboats in the USA; steamship generally refers to steam powered ships capable of carrying a (ship's) boat. The term steamwheeler is sometimes used but is generally considered to be inappropriate. Steamships gradually replaced sailing ships for commercial shipping through the nineteenth century, and they were in turn superseded by diesel-driven ships in the second half of the twentieth century. Most warships used steam propulsion until the advent of the gas turbine. Today, nuclear powered warships and submarines use steam to drive turbines, but are not referred to as steamships or steamboats. Screw-driven steamships generally carry the ship prefix "SS" before their names. Paddle steamers usually carry the prefix "PS" and Steamships powered by the steam turbine may be prefixed "TS" (Turbine Ship). The term steamer is occasionally used, out of nostalgia, for diesel motor-driven vessels, prefixed "MV". Image:paddle wheel small.jpg|Left: original paddlewheel from a paddle steamer on the lake of Lucerne. Right: detail of a steamer. Image:PS Waverley leaving Dunoon 1989.jpg|PS ''Waverley'' leaving Dunoon on the Firth of Clyde. Image:Dampfschiff.jpg|"Andreas" in Berlin
Early development As often happens with inventions, the development of the steam engine powered vessel involved many people, sometimes working at the same time. One of the first to propose the idea (around 1690) was the French physicist Denis Papin, inventor of the steam engine. In a 1690 article in Acta Eruditorum, he describes a steamboat equiped with four cylinders, propelling rotating wheels. In 1707 he constructed a paddle-powered boat, but whether it was full-size and steam-powered or not is unclear. River boatmen took exception to the threat to their trade and destroyed it at Loch, on September 27th 1707. In 1736 Jonathan Hulls took out a patent in England for a Newcomen engine-powered steamboat, but it was the improvement in steam engines by James Watt that made the concept feasible. William Henry of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, having learned of Watt's engine on a visit to England, made his own engine and in 1763 attempted to put it in a boat. The boat sank, and while he made an improved model he does not seem to have had much success, though he may have inspired others. In France, by 1774 the Marquis Claude de Jouffroy and colleagues had made a 13 meter working steamboat with rotating paddles, the Palmipède. The ship sailed on the Doubs in June and July 1776, apparently becoming the first steamship to sail succesfully. In 1783 a new paddle steamer, the ''Pyroscaphe'', successfully steamed up the river Saône for fifteen minutes before the engine failed, but bureaucracy thwarted further progress. From 1784 James Rumsey built a pump-driven boat (water-jet) that successfully steamed upstream on the Potomac river in 1786, and in the following year he obtained a patent from the State of Virginia. In Pennsylvania, John Fitch, an acquaintance of William Henry, had made a model paddle steamer in 1785, and subsequently developed propulsion by floats on a chain, obtained a patent in 1786, then built a steamboat which underwent a successful trial in 1787. The following year a second boat made 50 km (30 mile) excursions, and in 1790 a third boat ran a series of excursions on the Delaware River, but then patent disputes dissuaded Fitch from continuing. Meanwhile, Patrick Miller of Dalswinton, near Dumfries, Scotland, had developed double-hulled boats propelled by cranked paddlewheels placed between the hulls, and he engaged the engineer William Symington to build his patent steam engine into a boat which was successfully tried out on Dalswinton Loch in 1788, and followed by a larger steamboat the next year. Miller then abandoned the project, but ten years later Symington was engaged by Lord Dundas, and in March 1802, the Charlotte Dundas towed two 70 ton barges 30 km (almost 20 miles) along the Forth and Clyde Canal to Glasgow. This vessel, the first tow boat, has been called the "first practical steamboat", and the first to be followed by continuous development of steamboats. Although plans to introduce boats on the Forth and Clyde canal were thwarted by fears of erosion of the banks, development was taken up both in Britain and abroad. Robert Fulton, who may have become interested in steamboats when he visited William Henry in 1777 at the age of 12, visited Britain and France where he built and tested an experimental steamboat on the River Seine in 1803, and was aware of the success of the Charlotte Dundas. Before returning to the United States he ordered a Boulton and Watt steam engine, and on return built the North River Steamboat (often called the ''Clermont''). In 1807 this steamboat began a regular passenger boat service between New York and Clermont, 240 km (150 miles) distant, which was a commercial success. In 1808 John and James Winans built the Vermont in Burlington, Vermont, the second steamboat to operate commercially. In 1809 the Accommodation, built by the Hon. John Molson at Montreal, and fitted with engines made in that city, was running successfully between Montreal and Quebec, being the first steamer on the St. Lawrence and in Canada. The experience of both vessels showed that the new system of propulsion was commercially profitable, and as a result its application to the more open waters of the Great Lakes was next considered. The concretisation of that idea went on hiatus during the War of 1812 (which concluded in late 1814), however. In Scotland the ideas of the Charlotte Dundas were taken up by Henry Bell, and in 1812 the ''Comet'' began a passenger steamboat service on the River Clyde between Glasgow and Greenock. This was the first commercially successful service in Europe. In 1815, Pierre Andriel crossed the English Channel abord the Élise, marking the first sea-going use of a steam ship. Image:SteamboatEnglishPatent.gif|1736 steamboat English patent. Image:D'AbbansSteamshipModel.jpg|Model of steamship, built in 1784 by Jouffroy d'Abbans. Image:Clermont illustration - Robert Fulton - Project Gutenberg eText 15161.jpg|Robert Fulton's Clermont. Image:Elise-vapeur.gif|the Élise River steamboats
Lake, loch, estuary and sea-going steamers Henry Bell's Comet started a rapid expansion of steam services on the Firth of Clyde, and within four years a steamer service was in operation on the inland Loch Lomond, a forerunner of the lake steamers that still grace the Swiss lakes. Today the 1900 steamer SS Sir Walter Scott still sails on Loch Katrine, while on Loch Lomond the PS Maid of the Loch is being restored. On the Clyde itself, within ten years of the Comet's start there were nearly fifty steamers, and services had started across the Irish Sea to Belfast. By 1900 there were over 300 Clyde steamers. The paddle steamer ''Waverley'', built in 1947, is the last survivor of these fleets, and the last sea-going paddle steamer in the world. This ship sails a full season of cruises every year from places around Britain, and has sailed across the English Channel for a visit to commemorate the sinking of her predecessor of 1899 at the Battle of Dunkirk. People have had a particular affection for the Clyde puffers, small steam freighters on a traditional design developed to use the Scottish canals and to serve the Highlands and Islands. They were immortalised by the tales of Para Handy's boat The Vital Spark by Neil Munro and by the film The Maggie, and a small number are being conserved to continue in steam around the west highland sea lochs. The Clyde sludge boats had a tradition of occasionally taking passengers on their trips from Glasgow, past the Isle of Arran, down the Firth of Clyde, and one has emerged from retirement as "SS Shieldhall, Steam powered General Cargo-Passenger Steamer available for Trips in the Solent" offering outings from Southampton, England with views of the two triple expansion engines. Built in 1856, P.S. Skibladner is the oldest steamship still in operation, serving towns along lake Mjøsa in Norway. The 1912 steamer, TSS Earnslaw still operates on regular sight-seeing trips across Lake Wakatipu, an alpine lake near Queenstown, New Zealand. Image:PS Waverley off Greenock 1994.jpg|Paddle steamer PS ''Waverley'' steaming down the Firth of Clyde. Image:TS Queen Mary 1981.jpg|Turbine steamer TS Queen Mary. Image:SS_Shieldhall_in_Clyde_2005.jpg|SS ''Shieldhall'' steams down the Firth of Clyde. Ocean steamships
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