Superships of the Great Lakes: Thousand-foot Ships on the Great Lakes - Raymond A. Bawal - Google Books

https://books.google.de/books?id=_LTqoJtyM5MC&pg=PA33&dq=Belle+River+Plant

Since the beginning of commerce on the Great Lakes there has been a desire to build larger and more efficient ships. Beginning in the nineteenth century shipbuilders began to increase the size of their creations as new materials and construction techniques…