The wooden side wheel steamer L.W. Crane was built at Berlin, Wisconsin by McArthur and Company in 1865. The vessel was enrolled at Milwaukee and used as a steamer on the Fox River. During the Spring Season in 1868 the Crane (listed as the W.L. Crane) was used to ferry passengers and freight between Green Bay and Oconto. Later in June 1868 it was said that the steamer had been running on the Illinois River during the spring and was brought up the Mississippi and Wisconsin Rivers to Portage, Wisconsin where it was said that it was going to be taken out and across Lake Michigan to Manistee, Michigan.


In 1869 the L.W. Crane with two barges and two lighters in tow all loaded with lumber and shingles had departed Oshkosh for Dubuque, Iowa. At some point in the vessel's career it was purchased by a stock company traveled down the Mississippi River to the Alleghany River. The steamer would return to Oshkosh in 1874. In August 1874, there was a U.S. Marshal's sale due to George H. Day vs. Steamer L.W. Crane. Where the vessel was sold at public auction on 14 August in Prairie du Chien. In 1875 the L.W. Crane was used for clearing the Wisconsin River, the vessel with five laborers kept ahead of the construction party, falling the learning timber and pulling snags along the partially improved channel.
The L.W. Crane burned to the water's edge at the St. Paul R.R. slip in Oshkosh during the summer of 1880.