Captain Farr and the Tugboat “Warrior” : How a Dockworker Changed San Pedro

Saturday, February 25 th, 11:00 a.m. San Pedro Regional Library, Phil Scott Community Room, 9th and Gaffey Streets, San Pedro. 

Free Historic Speaker Series:

Description: One hundred twenty years ago, Charles Farr, a dockworker from England, came to San Pedro to start a ministry to sailors in the early days of the Port of Los Angeles (1901-1920). Back then the town of San Pedro still had dirt streets and no electric lights, and women wore skirts to their ankles. Farr had a big dream, and he approached the Banning company, run by the sons of the late Phineas Banning, “The Father of the Los Angeles Harbor,” about an old 92-foot long tugboat in the harbor. To everyone’s amazement, the Banning brothers donated the hull of the legendary decommissioned Warrior I to use as a center for ministry and social work to seafarers. Farr built a “floating Bethel,” a house of God, atop the hull, and dragged it up onto land alongside the main channel. There he cared for seafarers, fishermen, and squatters until 1920. Major photos and feature articles about him were run in the Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Herald, and San Pedro Daily News. 

Bio of Presenter: G. W. Goldsmith is a journalist and board member of Beacon Light Mission in Wilmington, CA, an organization that was founded about the same time as Captain Farr’s.

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