Venue: Clinton Area Showboat Theatre
Town: Clinton, US

The Clinton Area Showboat Theatre is a summer stock professional theatre in Clinton, Iowa. Currently run by Executive Producer James Kyle Davis, the showboat has been drydocked on the Army Corps of Engineers Levee. With a 217-seat theater, the Clinton Showboat has produced musicals and comedies for 39 years. The original boat was built in 1936 by the Dravo Corporation near Pittsburgh and named Omar. She was created as a working boat, a coal-fired towboat for the Ohio River Company. Primarily steel, the boat is 207 feet long, 36 feet wide, and 37½ feet high. In the water, it displaces 581 gross tons. The oaken paddlewheel, rebuilt in 1980, is approximately 32 feet in diameter. It was powered by two Marietta compound steam wheel engines that required 25 to 75 tons of coal a day. These engines produced 1,000 horsepower. For 25 years, Omar pushed barges up and down the Ohio River. In 1962, the Ohio River Company donated the boat her to the State of West Virginia for its centennial celebration. The State of West Virginia converted the towboat into a showboat. The builder preserved the main deck, lounge and second deck captain's quarters. The original galley area and crew's quarters became the theater. By raising the pilothouse, the builders created a new third deck, providing theatre balcony and museum exhibition space. The pilothouse retained the captain's control wheel and the high view of the river. The new showboat was renamed Rhododendron, the West Virginia state flower. On September 15, 1966, the city of Clinton, Iowa, purchased Rhododendron from the state of West Virginia at a public bid price of $21,165. A week later, the boat began its 1,600 mile journey from Morgantown, WV to Clinton. It was towed down the Monongahela River to Pittsburgh, then down the Ohio to Cairo, IL, then up the Mississippi River to Clinton. Moored at Riverfront Park in Clinton, the boat was used by the city as a floating theatre. In 1975, the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers began constructio