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You must remember 'Tugboat Annie'...

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Tugboat Annie was inspired by a real life character, a woman from
Tacoma, Washington

Back a hundred years or so ago, this woman and her family lived in a
ramshackle cabin on the Tacoma waterfront. In an attempt to make ends
meet, our heroine (Thea) put aside a few cents fro the grovery budget
each week until she eventually accumulated enough money to buy a small
rowboat. She put up a sign, "rowboat for rent", and put aside all the
rental income until she could afford to buy a second rowboat.
Eventually she was renting an entire fleet of
rowboats, and the family built a two story building with a boathouse
below and living quarters above. Eventually she acquired a little power
boat, (probably a steam launch), and began accepting work pushing and
dragging stuff around Commencement Bay.

Thea's enterprise flourished, and survives to this day. While it's no
longer headquartered in Tacoma, the citizens down there renamed "City
Waterway" after this ambitious businesswoman a few years ago. The
waterway is now known as "Thea Foss" waterway, and the company she
founded? Foss Tug and Barge.