Ferry service between Galveston Island and the Bolivar Peninsula began on April 12, 1930, with six daily round trips in daylight only. The ferries Galveston and Jefferson were operated by Southern States Transportation Company for about two years before being sold to Galveston County, which ran them for six months and then turned them over to the State of Texas. A nominal toll was charged until 1950, when two new boats built by Todd Shipyards in Galveston replaced the originals, which were sold. Costing $1,210,000, the R.S. Sterling was delivered in May and the Cone Johnson in June. A third boat, the E.H. Thorton Jr., was added in February 1959. The Cone Johnson was retired from active service on February 2, 1995, after being replaced by the Dewitt C. Greer. Originally 185 feet long and 55 feet wide, each boat carried about 52 vehicles; in 1977 they were lengthened by 60 feet and widened by 11 feet, and at 245 feet long and 66 feet wide each then carried about 70 vehicles. A fourth ferry, the Gibb Gilchrist, entered service in April 1977 after being built by Jeffboat, Inc., in Jeffersonville, Indiana, at a cost of $5,000,000. The Robert C. Lanier was christened on April 4, 1991, the Dewitt C. Greer on January 27, 1995, the Ray Stoker, Jr. entered service on November 12, 1997, as a replacement vessel for the R.S. Sterling, and the Robert H. Dedman entered service on February 18, 1999. The Stoker cost $8.3 million and the Dedman cost $9.7 million. The Lanier, Greer, Stoker, and Dedman used a unique propulsion system made by Voith-Schneider America, Inc., of Heidenheim, Germany, with no conventional propellers or rudders. All ferries were double-ended, with the captain changing from one pilothouse to the other to reverse direction. Operated as a free service by the Texas Department of Transportation, the route formed a link in State Highway 87 across 2.7 miles of Galveston Bay, ran 24 hours a day in all weather, took about 18 minutes to cross and about 50 minutes for a round trip, and set one-day records of 12,733 vehicles on July 4, 1993, and 43,472 passengers on July 3, 1994. Near the west end of Bolivar Peninsula, the Bolivar Lighthouse was built in 1872 and guided ships for 61 years until its retirement in 1933, when it was replaced by the South Jetty Light. The brick lighthouse, sheathed in riveted cast iron plates, stood 117 feet high and had a 52,000 candlepower beacon fueled by kerosene converted into gas, producing eight rays of light every 15 seconds at night. During the 1900 Storm, winds made the lighthouse sway so much that the light failed to rotate, and first keeper H.C. Claiborne turned it by hand and saved 125 lives. During the 1915 Storm, the lighthouse withstood winds of 125 miles per hour while 61 people found refuge there as 11-foot tides battered it. In 1970, the Bolivar light appeared in the television movie “My Sweet Charlie,” filmed in Galveston and on the peninsula.
