A Look Back
By Fred Miller
One hundred and twenty years ago, August 7, 1900, Rev. Ezra B. Lake died after a short illness at the age of 66. He was one of Ocean City’s founders, and was remembered by mourners as a minister, organizer, civic leader, developer, and inventor. Today the spotlight is on Ezra B. Lake the inventor.
Necessity is the mother of invention and 136 years ago Rev. Lake saw the need for a lifesaving vehicle to rescue shipwreck victims and endangered bathers. The men of the U. S. Life Saving Service were responsible for ocean rescues. Their lifesaving equipment was limited to lifeboats and breeches buoys.
Rev. Lake designed and built a vehicle he called a Sea Wagon. He believed it would replace the lifeboat and on December 18, 1884, he was ready to demonstrate his machine.
This was a well-publicized event which drew hundreds of people to the Fourth Street beach to watch the initial test drive. Watching with great interest were the island’s top U. S. Life Saving Service officials including Captain James S. Willets, Captain Leaming Godfrey, and Captain Charles D. Stephens.
It was a strange looking contraption: a pyramid made of iron rods with the peak cut off and a platform placed on the top. The structure was attached to big wheels, propelled by a steam engine, and steered by a crank on the platform. An American flag flew from the top railing.
The demonstration went well and after the Sea Wagon was back on the beach Rev. Lake addressed the assembled crowd saying, “By this test all weaknesses and defects were made manifest, which are being promptly remedied. The wagon wheels will not bury in the sand, as some feared. It can be run out to a wreck when a boat cannot be launched, the higher the sea the more quickly it will work its way out. It can be controlled by steering gears, and can be run backwards or forwards by simply changing the gearing by the man on the top. At a wreck, ladders may be run down, not up, to the vessel’s deck, long enough to allow for the heavy seas, the Sea Wagon remaining perfectly at rest as the sea sweeps through its skeleton form.”
The Sea Wagon was never embraced by the U. S. Life Saving Service and it faded into history—until now. It was back on the Ocean City beach this summer not as a tool for ocean rescue, but as a tool for beach replenishment.
