The sternwheel packet Ben Hur was built by the Knox Boat Yard at Harmar (Marietta), Ohio, in 1887, the same year as the founding of The Waterways Journal. Constructed on a wooden hull measuring 165 feet in length by 30.5 feet in width, the boat initially came out in the Pittsburgh–Parkersburg trade. Three boilers supplied steam to engines (16-inch cylinders with 5.5-foot stroke) that were recycled from the towboat Ed Hobbs.