River Queen: The Amazing Story of Tugboat Titan Lucille Johnstone

Lucille Johnstone graduated from the Fairview High School of Commerce in 1940, and then took a job as receptionist for the Sally Shops on Water Street in Vancouver. Thanks to her hard work, brains and initiative, at age twenty-four she was the entire office staff—secretary, bookkeeper, personnel manager and dispatcher—for River Towing, a tugboat company. The operation ran on a shoestring at the time but grew to become Rivtow Straits, a company with 1,500 employees and annual sales of $250 million—in large part because of Lucille, who knew how to stretch a dollar (she used both sides of the adding machine tape), and how to keep the goodwill of creditors and jump when opportunity knocked. Eventually she told her story to Paul E. Levy, who made it into a book, River Queen: The Amazing Story of Tugboat Titan Lucille Johnstone (Harbour), an absorbing read even for people who think they’re not interested in reading about business. Lucille served on the boards of many large companies and consortiums, and she took an active role, which she describes so clearly and succinctly that the workings of big business are opened up to mainstream readers. By the end of the book I had grown quite fond of Lucille, who is described by her son as “like a tugboat. Rather small but usually pulling a big ship.”