There’s a Canadian freighter with a special box just for shore-to-ship pizza deliveries. You can tell, Jimmy Hogan said, because when his family’s boat pulls up alongside and the crew lowers the container down three stories from the rail, it says “Pizza Box” on the side.
The rest of the J.W. Westcott Co.’s business is less certain, which is why it’s about to float something most people like as much as pepperoni:
Music.
The company has a nice chunk of land along the Detroit River, at the foot of 24th Street half a mile south of the Ambassador Bridge. It has 152 years’ worth of accumulated nerve: Anyone else care to nestle a 45-foot-long converted tugboat against the hull of a moving 740-foot ore carrier in windy, choppy darkness?
It still has a contract with the U.S. Postal Service, and the J.W. Westcott II continues to be the only nonmilitary vessel with its own ZIP code, 48222. But in a changing, email-driven world, Hogan said, they’re continually keeping watch for new opportunities.
June 6, then, will bring the launch of the Westcott Sessions, a series of riverside concerts featuring live performances, food trucks, vendors, vibes, boat tours and maybe the best summertime backdrop imaginable — a parade of lakers, gliding past behind the stage.
“You’re doing a set,” said Hogan’s brother Bryan, putting himself on the scene, “and a giant ship is right behind you, and the Westcott II is pulling out from the dock, and the big foghorns are going off.”
Even in a city known for music, that sounds noteworthy.
Same name, different worlds
James Joseph-Westcott Hogan, 42, and Bryan Patrick-Westcott Hogan, 37, represent the fifth generation of a family business dating to 1874.
That’s when John Ward Westcott started delivering destination and docking information, by rowboat, to vessels on the Detroit River.
Into the 1990s, the Westcott II was delivering 1.5 million pieces of mail per year to moving targets, at whatever time they happened by.
While a few keystrokes can suffice for most correspondence these days, the Westcott II stays busy. Mariners want lots of priority and express stamps, for whatever reason, “and we still do quite a bit of mail, U.S. and Canadian,” Jimmy said.
Amazon cartons, absentee ballots, parts, groceries — the company provides whatever might be needed on the water, on the fly.
“We’re the last stop for DoorDash,” he said.
A lot of the time, though, “we’re just sitting here looking out at the river,” and alongside a strait with an average depth of 35 feet, that’s an invitation to deep thoughts.
“We have a lot of space here. What should we do with it?” he and Bryan asked themselves.
One answer was events. There was a wedding last year, along with corporate get-togethers for Bedrock and Carhartt. More of that is in the works.
But those are private. If the river is a public treasure and summer weather is a long-awaited pleasure, what could bring those two things together?
To start with, Cami Rose and Liam Kelley.
Casting a wide net on the riverbank
Rose describes her music as country soul. She’s the 5 p.m. opener at the first of the Westcott Sessions, followed by Kelley, who Bryan Hogan categorizes as an indie rocker.
Three weeks later, on June 27, DJs will spin house and techno. More shows will be added in July and August, he said, and by next year, the goal will be weekly events.
Only 250 tickets will be sold for each of them, with gates thrown wide by 1 p.m. Tickets should hit WestcottSessions.com by early May, Bryan said, and he has high hopes a liquor permit will arrive shortly. For most everything else — acts, food trucks, sales booths — ideas are welcome at info@westcottsessions.com.
“We’re opening our doors to everybody,” he said, while positioning the shows as both an all-day destination and a gateway to whatever’s going on later downtown.
Meantime, it’ll be business as usual for Jimmy’s end of things, the part that runs on diesel.
The shipping season officially began with the opening of the Soo Locks at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday, March 25.
He already has one of his boats in the water: the Mildred S. Westcott, specially configured to deliver pilots to ships. The Westcott II and the Joseph J. Hogan will be arriving shortly from their winter home at a Downriver marina.
Bryan, who has a day job selling medical devices, pictures the boats as part of the ambience, or even the entertainment. But it’s the music that will determine whether the Westcott Sessions sink or swim.
As they’ve been saying in his family since Ulysses S. Grant was president, “We still have to deliver.”
Reach Neal Rubin at NARubin@freepress.com.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: The J.W. Westcott mail boat floats something new — summer concerts
Reporting by Neal Rubin, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
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