Archive for January, 2009

A Meandering Memoir: A River’s Impact on the Arkansas Delta

by Mary Anne Parker, Debbie Van Winkle, and Shea Lewis

Photo by Cindy Cox

Photo by Cindy Cox

When the Spanish expedition led by Hernando de Soto arrived in what is now known as eastern Arkansas and the St. Francis River in June of 1541, a scribe described the unknown area: “Along the entire bank of that river and throughout the vicinity, there were numerous fields of corn and a great number of fruit trees, all of which proved the land to be fertile.” In the short period since then, life on the St. Francis River has changed drastically. Parkin Archeological State Park preserves and interprets a section of the St. Francis River today, yet the focus is not on the river itself but what took place next to it.

A relationship between humans and the river was developed by the very first inhabitants of the area, and that relationship still exists today. The river has provided opportunities for countless individuals to improve their lives. Visitors come to Parkin Archeological State Park with different perspectives and personal experiences—and their own ideas about why the park should be preserved today.

The historic fabric of the park is filled with strands that are begging to be interpreted. Opportunities to experience the places where history happened abound. Through living history, museum exhibits, artifacts, archeological tours, artifact demonstrations, special workshops, and school events, visitors have the chance to develop a connection to the archeological site. When visitors leave, it is a goal of the park to have widened their perspectives on the area—past and present—and allow their personal experiences to connect to those who have used the land next to the river.

The St. Francis River begins its journey in southeast Missouri and meanders its way some 470 miles before joining the Mississippi River just north of Helena, Arkansas. Along this route, the St. Francis emerges from mountains and flows gently through cane forests, swamplands, and the Ozarks, all the while transitioning from a small, clear stream to a lake and eventually into a muddy tributary.

Throughout the course of written history, and much before it, the St. Francis River itself witnessed vast amounts of change. Clovis points found on Crowley’s Ridge, an unusual geological formation located just west of the river, indicate that the St. Francis River valley has been continuously occupied for at least 12,000 years. Large-scale Mississippian towns, provinces, and societies, of which as many as 22,000 have been documented in eastern Arkansas alone, flourished up and down the banks of the St. Francis and her tributaries from approximately 1000 to 1600 A.D. Later, the St. Francis guided conquistadors who crossed the Mississippi, French who explored her banks to the south, and then early American entrepreneurs who logged, trapped, and traded up and down her banks.

The St. Francis River was a source of food, water, and raw materials. The Casqui people are portrayed here digging clay for making pottery while children gather river mussels in the shallows. Courtesy Arkansas Department of Parks and Tourism

The St. Francis River was a source of food, water, and raw materials. The Casqui people are portrayed here digging clay for making pottery while children gather river mussels in the shallows. Courtesy Arkansas Department of Parks and Tourism

Mississippi Delta rivers are not known to sit idly and watch change roll by. The St. Francis River is no exception, willingly participating as an active partner ofchange alongside her banks. The most consistent threat to residents living beside the St. Francis is and always has been flooding. Inhabitants of the ancient village of Casqui, located within the state park today, built their entire village eight to 12 feet above her banks to defend themselves from the St. Francis’s seemingly moody ebbs and flows. In 1811–1812, the New Madrid earthquakes again sent permanent residents, as well as itinerant fur trappers and traders along the banks of the St. Francis, into a frenzy, as literally tens of thousands of acres in three Arkansas counties slipped into an endless marsh of “sunken lands” beneath her waters. Again in 1927, the St. Francis affected historic Parkin—along with every other county along her banks—when she was out as much as 14 feet above flood stage for up to a four-month period, forcing the evacuation of every resident in nearby towns.

While the St. Francis River bides her time witnessing and inflicting change, change has not altogether passed her by. The damming of the St. Francis provided flood control, recreation, and water supply. The building of levees guided her away from her historic mood swings, bends, and turns, and towards a more “civilized” course. Flood drainage ditches relieved farmers’ plights of bad crops, dry years, and flood problems, but led pesticides, insecticides, and other foreign agents into her waters. The crystal clear St. Francis River that de Soto encountered in 1541 is a far cry from today’s slow, silt-laden, and shallow channel.

Changes along the winding St. Francis are not limited by time and geography alone. This ever-shifting river also changes lives. The clarity and moderate temperament of the St. Francis River has lured people to settle this area from as long ago as 1000 AD. The water of this river has grown crops, satisfied thirst, provided sustenance, fortified towns, transported goods and people, and given centuries of occupants the building blocks upon which to build their daily lives.

Chief Casqui’s mound today, where the cross was raised by de Soto, is a tangible reminder of what has taken place next to the St. Francis River and is a centerpiece of Parkin Archeological State Park. Courtesy Arkansas Department of Parks and Tourism

Chief Casqui’s mound today, where the cross was raised by de Soto, is a tangible reminder of what has taken place next to the St. Francis River and is a centerpiece of Parkin Archeological State Park. Courtesy Arkansas Department of Parks and Tourism

These attractive qualities sometimes came at a price. When Hernando de Soto and his army of conquistadors encountered the area in 1541, his scribes recorded the struggles of the village of Casqui alongside the St. Francis River. In the early to mid-16th century, the small Mississippian empire of Casqui was in perpetual warfare with the neighboring Pacaha over rule of this desired waterway and the fertile lands that the river had created. Though the Pacaha tribe was located on the mighty Mississippi River, the St. Francis’s bends and curves made for a more conducive site for animals to nest, villages to thrive, and, more importantly, for people to be able to defend. These reasons, along with the egos and power lust of the leaders, led to the constant conflict de Soto noted alongside the St. Francis in the 16th century.

In addition to the constant conflict, the village was also experiencing a period of prolonged drought. With 2,000 mouths to feed in this village and many thousands more in the surrounding chiefdom, the ruler, Casqui, and his people eagerly welcomed the Spaniards in hopes of assistance. This initial encounter between Casqui and de Soto included an exchange of gifts, including fish from the St. Francis.

Over the course of the visit, an alliance of sorts was formed and Casqui endeavored to persuade de Soto to aid his people. Casqui entreated the powerful conquistador to call on the Spanish gods to grant them rain as relief from the drought. Not only did de Soto promise prayer, but he had an enormous cross erected next to the chief’s house, on top of the ceremonial mound that towered over the village. The scribes on the expedition wrote that it took 100 men to raise the enormous cross that overlooked the St. Francis and ushered in the first known Christian ceremony west of the Mississippi.  One of the witnesses’ accounts documented on the day following the ceremony, it rained.

The St. Francis River provided fertile soil and moisture that produced a dense forest. The Northern Ohio Cooperage and Lumber Company capitalized on that gift and harvested millions of board feet of lumber with basic tools and equipment. Courtesy Farris Collection

The St. Francis River provided fertile soil and moisture that produced a dense forest. The Northern Ohio Cooperage and Lumber Company capitalized on that gift and harvested millions of board feet of lumber with basic tools and equipment. Courtesy Farris Collection

Because of a number of factors—warfare, drought, and population growth—the village was abandoned and settlement in this small corner of the river would be sparse until the river’s qualities were again harnessed on a large scale with the Northern Ohio Sawmill. The river once again employed the building of an empire. Sawmilling cleared the giant bald cypress trees from this swampy morass and paved the way for the fertile agricultural dynasty of the Arkansas Delta. In 1906, the Northern Ohio Cooperage and Lumber Company set up a mill on the shores of St. Francis River and built a new village where the ancient village of Casqui once stood. The company harvested millions of board feet of lumber, primarily cypress, that was shipped all over the United States.

Lumber was not the only thing created by the company. The fledgling town of Parkin, Arkansas, would be home to mill-manufactured resident housing, a church, a boarding house, a company store, shotgun-style homes, a Masonic lodge, and much more. The mill side of Parkin was affectionately termed “Sawdust Hill.” To accommodate the children of the predominantly black workforce, the company built a one-room schoolhouse and dubbed it the Northern Ohio School. The segregated schoolhouse provided a first-through eighth-grade education for the children of the mill workers until the 1950s. The school has been renovated and is now actively interpreted as part of the park along with the compelling story of the shaping of the Delta and early 20th-century rural Arkansas.

In order to use the river more effectively, mill workers and other Arkansans in the Delta began building levees to protect their towns and drainage ditches to empty the swamps. More and more people were able to move onto the richest farmland in the world, and as the economy boomed, caution about what the St. Francis had done throughout history was thrown to the wind. No one in Arkansas was terribly concerned about above-average rainfall in Canada during the fall and winter of 1926. Yet by the spring of 1927, the Mississippi River was 80 miles wide throughout eastern Arkansas and had laid her claim to the St. Francis, the White, and the Arkansas Rivers, as well as all of their drainage districts, thus creating the worst flood in U.S. history.

As Mark Twain said in the book  Mark Twain in Eruption, “The Mississippi River will always have its own way; no engineering skill can persuade it to do otherwise….” The Flood of ’27, as it came to be known, swept a path of complete destruction through the Delta. In Arkansas alone the flood left between a quarter and a half of the state under water, more than 100 people dead, and thousands more displaced. In the hamlet of Sawdust Hill, those who could not or did not escape before the flood sought refuge on the remnants of the mound built by the Casqui people centuries earlier.

Even though the Great Depression was technically a couple of years away, the St. Francis River witnessed things just about as bad as they could get in 1927. The Great Depression did eventually impact Parkin, an already relatively poor area. The impact was devastating, but work was available at the sawmill, area farms, or by digging mussel shells along the banks of the St. Francis River. With all of the relief packages that started with the New Deal, under President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the Northern Ohio School was selected as one of the pilot locations for a program that would later become the National School Lunch Program.

As much damage as this river can inflict on nearby residents, its occupants can be even more devastating to the river. The cypress forests that held the soil in place were cleared by the sawmill industry. Every year the plows that dig into the soil to plant cotton, soybeans, rice, and milo displace more of this rich topsoil, which ends up as silt in this once crystal-clear river. Pesticides, fertilizers, and trash continue to make their way into this historical river, sullying its significant legacy.

Despite all of these negative changes wrought by the interactions of the river and people, the overarching ambiance is joyful. The St. Francis River has enriched the lives of the people who have lived along its shores. It has provided food and recreation for people who fish, both ancient and modern. The shells of the mussels have been crushed and added to Mississippian pottery, probed for pearls, cut into buttons, and treasured for their iridescent beauty. During a time of Jim Crow laws and oppression, members of the Shady Grove Missionary Baptist Church on Sawdust Hill looked to this river for comfort and solace as a place to baptize their parishioners. And generations have turned to its cooling waters for swimming and fun on hot Arkansas summer days.

The St. Francis River continues to produce untold stories. During the spring of 2008, Parkin Archeological State Park’s station archeologist received a phone call. After some of the worst flooding along its banks in over 30 years, a group of fishermen made a discovery atop one of the sandbars. There, partially underwater, partially exposed, was a dugout canoe. The fishermen were ecstatic. Was it an ancient Indian vessel? Was it a dugout from French fur trappers in the 1600s? Was it an early 20th-century canoe that just looked old? Only the St. Francis and future research, including carbon dating, can be sure. One thing is for certain: the St. Francis River will continue to inspire fishermen, park interpreters, and visitors for generations to come.

Parkin Archeological State Park exists today to research and interpret what takes place along the banks of the St. Francis River. The meeting between Casqui and de Soto and the shaping of the Arkansas Delta are two compelling stories that are being uncovered and explored. Research is ongoing. Discoveries are being made. Stories like those of the exposed dugout canoe are waiting to be told. How these stories are interpreted will dictate the relationships that are developed between the park and its visitors. Opportunities have been provided for an unknown number of people to enrich their lives alongside the St. Francis River. These opportunities still exist today, for visitors and residents alike, because of the partnership between the Arkansas Archeological Survey, Arkansas State Parks, and the ever-changing St. Francis River.

Mary Anne Parker, CIG, and Debbie Van Winkle, CIG, are park interpreters and Shea Lewis, CHI, CIM, is the park superintendent at Parkin Archeological State Park in Parkin, Arkansas. They can be reached at maryanne.parker@arkansas.gov, debbie.vanwinkle@arkansas.gov, and shea.lewis@arkansas.gov, respectively.

Navigating the Timeless Waters of the Upper Mississippi

by Julie Cutler

Great Blue Heron on the Mississippi: Sixty percent of all North American birds migrate along the Mississippi River’s flyway. Photo by Matthew Schillerberg, Trailheads Photography

Great Blue Heron on the Mississippi: Sixty percent of all North American birds migrate along the Mississippi River’s flyway. Photo by Matthew Schillerberg, Trailheads Photography

For a river pilot in 1860, to know the Great Mississippi River was to navigate through as-yet uncharted waters. The knowledge necessary to guide a steamer safely through and around reefs, bars, snags, and sunken wrecks was the knowledge of every curve, bend, bluff, knob, and treetop in light and dark, upstream and downstream. It was the time before dams directed water in a permanent channel and before beacons and buoys marked a safe passageway.

In George Byron Merrick’s account of steamboat pilots on the Mississippi River in the middle of the 1800s, he said, “To ‘know the river’ fully, the pilot must not only know everything which may be seen by the eye, but he must also feel for a great deal of information of the first importance which is not revealed to the eye alone.” A mental chart of the river allowed pilots to run the river as they knew it to be—not as they could see it—and they did this in an environment that was inherently in flux.

Steamboat pilot at the wheel, 1912. Photo courtesy John Runk, Minnesota Historical Society

Steamboat pilot at the wheel, 1912. Photo courtesy John Runk, Minnesota Historical Society

This type of river knowledge comes from profound, deep, and direct experience on the river—experience that makes one part of the river and its story. Today, there are still people with this deep and abiding knowledge of the river who understand both the stories that they can see emerging on the banks of the Mississippi River and those that they intuit from their connections to a river layered with history and shaped by human ingenuity. These are people anchored in and oriented by the river.

For me, the Great River is more like a force I continue to be drawn back to again and again. I was born on the banks of the Mississippi River in New Orleans. Thus, my life started where the river, laden with traces of people and places far upstream, mixes with the sea to form a broad, ever-changing delta. Perhaps that is why my understanding of the Mississippi River is as a vital whole where all things change, mix together, and in one way or another connect.

Today, I live in Saint Paul, Minnesota, which is closer to the headwaters where the Mighty Mississippi takes root. From where I write, less than a quarter of a mile from the Mississippi, I can see its ebb and flow, watch the changing seasons marked by migration, and examine the decks of passing barges heralded by low, resonant chords. I am one of the few, fortunate people who can claim to reside within a national park. The Mississippi National River and Recreation Area (MNRRA) just turned 20 years old. It was established by Congress in 1988 as part of the National Park System to protect, preserve, and enhance the Mississippi River—its natural features, cultural heritage, historical resources, scenic vistas, recreational opportunities, and economic vitality.

Located within the Twin Cities metropolitan area, MNRRA includes 72 miles of river, three National Historic Landmarks, as well as numerous other historic sites and natural features of national significance.

“MNRRA is a unique national park,” said Superintendent Paul Labovitz, “because we are a partnership park. Many national parks depend on people coming to them. At MNRRA, we go to people; thus, our park doesn’t look like a traditional national park with entrance gates and extensive facilities. Instead, MNRRA is a constellation of partner sites that are knit together by the river.”

Through its partners, its own programs at a range of locations along the river, and its modest visitor center located in the Science Museum of Minnesota in downtown Saint Paul, MNRAA tells the story of the Mississippi River.

America’s Great River
The Mississippi River is America’s river, and its story is as much a story of people as it is a story of nature. Even simple statistics reveal why the Mississippi River has been coined America’s Great River. It stretches some 2,350 miles from Lake Itasca in Minnesota to the Gulf of Mexico and gathers water from America’s heartland, or about 40 percent of the continental United States. More than 50 U.S. cities, or about 18 million people, get their drinking water from the Mississippi River each day.

Leopard frogs, bald eagles, Blanding’s turtles, ducks, deer, river otters, foxes, sparrows, and much more find shelter and food in the river’s floodplain forests, wetlands, prairies, oak savannas, and woodlands. All told, more than 900 species of birds, mammals, amphibians, reptiles, fish, and mussels call the Mississippi River basin home, and 60 percent of all North American birds fly along its ancient migratory route up and down the globe’s longest flyway.

Layered with History

Captain Seth Eastman of the First Infantry stationed at Fort Snelling from 1841 to 1848 captured the Mississippi River landscape of the time through his watercolors. He spent time with the Ojibwe and Dakota, learned to speak their languages, and observed their customs. Through this interaction, Eastman left a visual record of the confluence in the middle of the 19th century. Photo courtesy Seth Eastman, Minnesota Historical Society

Captain Seth Eastman of the First Infantry stationed at Fort Snelling from 1841 to 1848 captured the Mississippi River landscape of the time through his watercolors. He spent time with the Ojibwe and Dakota, learned to speak their languages, and observed their customs. Through this interaction, Eastman left a visual record of the confluence in the middle of the 19th century. Photo courtesy Seth Eastman, Minnesota Historical Society

The Mississippi River resonates through time. According to David Wiggins, MNRRA park ranger, “Even the word ‘Mississippi’ harkens from ancient roots. It is an Algonquin word used by the Ojibwe to mean, ‘father of waters, or great waters.’”

Archeologists have been able to trace people along the upper Mississippi for at least 12,000 years, which is about the time of the last glacial retreat, when the glacial Lake Agassiz drained down the River Warren to create the “father of waters.”

About 11,000 years ago, a massive waterfall formed near what is now downtown Saint Paul. At the time, the waterfall would have outshone Niagara Falls. Water from glacial Lake Agassiz cascaded 175 feet from top to bottom, and the falls spanned some 2,700 feet across. Over thousands of years, the falls retreated through soft limestone up the river to what is now downtown Minneapolis and in so doing carved the only gorge along the entire length of the river. The waterfall that remains today is known as Saint Anthony Falls.

The first written account of Saint Anthony Falls came from a Frenchman, Father Louis Hennepin, in 1680. Though Spanish explorers had traveled up the Mississippi River prior to 1600, the French were the first Europeans to establish long-lasting trade with local populations through the fur trade industry. When Hennepin and his companions explored the upper Mississippi around 1680 in search of the fabled Northwest Passage, several different Native American groups occupied the area, some having been dislocated from their ancestral lands in the east by Europeans. At the time of French contact, the Eastern or Santee Dakota inhabited much of Minnesota. The Santee included the Mdewakanton, Wahpeton, Wahkepute, and Sisseton. Together these people came to be known by the French as the “Sioux.”

Fort Snelling was built at the confluence of the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers in the early 1820s. Today, it is a National Historic Landmark. Photo by Matthew Schillerberg, Trailheads Photography

Fort Snelling was built at the confluence of the Mississippi and Minnesota rivers in the early 1820s. Today, it is a National Historic Landmark. Photo by Matthew Schillerberg, Trailheads Photography

By the middle of the 1700s, the Ojibwe had pushed the Dakota, or Sioux, away from the headwaters of the Mississippi in northern Minnesota toward the plains of what is now North Dakota and south into the Mississippi River valley below Saint Anthony Falls to the confluence of the Mississippi River and the Minnesota River, where the Dakota were already present in smaller numbers. For the Dakota, the confluence is a place of importance. The Dakota call the confluence “B’dote.”

In 1851, the Dakota Friend reported on the Dakota’s understanding of “B’dote.” According to the newspaper, “One of the great natural facts is that the mouth of the Minnesota River lies immediately over the center of the earth and under the center of the heavens.” Thus, even today the Dakota understand the confluence to be the center of all things.

They weren’t the only ones who understood the importance of this confluence. In the early 1800s, this portion of the Mississippi River became a fur trading center. After the signing of the Louisiana Purchase in 1803, the United States established sovereignty over lands extending from the Atlantic Ocean to the Rocky Mountains. The American Fur Company was founded in 1811 and rapidly established trading posts around the upper Midwest to compete with established French and British fur trading operations in the region.

While the French and English had been exploring the upper Mississippi River for more than a century, the area was only fully documented following surveying expeditions led by American explorers and sponsored by the U.S. military. In 1805, Zebulon Pike explored portions of the Mississippi River and began negotiating with the Dakota for land to build a fort at the confluence. From 1820 to 1824, the U.S. military constructed a fort at the confluence, in part, to regulate and secure the fur trade for American companies. The fort was named for Colonel Josiah Snelling, who oversaw its construction. Fort Snelling rapidly became the center of American culture and power in the area, a major trading point, and the western edge of the new American nation.

By the 1830s, an ever-growing number of American missionaries, entrepreneurs, farmers, and settlers were coming to the area. At the same time, fur trading operations had depleted the region’s game and fur resources. This did not bode well for the Dakota, who eventually would be forced to leave the confluence. In 1851, high above the confluence on Pilot Knob, the Dakota signed the Treaty of Mendota, giving up their lands west of the Mississippi River and south along the Minnesota River. Eleven years later, after the 1862 Dakota Conflict, the government imprisoned some 1,700 Dakota men, women, and children in the bottomlands below Fort Snelling at the confluence. Today, Fort Snelling is a National Historic Landmark.

Shaped by Human Ingenuity
As the head of navigation on the Mississippi River, Saint Paul had become a bustling port by the middle of the 19th century. Immigrants disembarked, merchants and farmers deposited goods for transport, and people set off by land for points north and west of Saint Paul. As for Minneapolis’s riverfront, it too was an industrious place in the mid to late 1800s. By the end of the 19th century, the people of Minneapolis had created the country’s greatest direct-drive waterpower industrial district. Saint Anthony Falls was instrumental in the development of Minneapolis because it first furnished direct power to the lumber industry and later the flour industry, both of which stimulated the development of the new city. By the late 1800s, Minneapolis was the nation’s leading flour milling center. Names such as Betty Crocker, Pillsbury, and Gold Medal Flour came to be along the Mississippi.

Completed in 1881, the Pillsbury A Mill was the world’s largest flour mill for 40 years and operated two of the most powerful direct-drive waterwheels ever built. Today, it is a National Historic Landmark. Image courtesy Minnesota Historical Society

Completed in 1881, the Pillsbury A Mill was the world’s largest flour mill for 40 years and operated two of the most powerful direct-drive waterwheels ever built. Today, it is a National Historic Landmark. Image courtesy Minnesota Historical Society

Before 1866, during the heyday of Mississippi River steamers, the river still possessed most of its natural characteristics. However, it wasn’t long before the river was transformed from a natural river to a navigable commercial artery, and the Twin Cities of Minneapolis and Saint Paul were instrumental in this transformation.

“Lying at the head of navigation on the river, the Twin Cities had to see that the entire Mississippi River was remade,” said MNRRA historian. “They needed the river to deliver new immigrants and the tools and provisions necessary to populate the land, and they demanded a navigable river so they could deliver the bounty of their labor to the rest of the country and the world.”

Over the next 100 years, the upper Mississippi River would be dramatically transformed into a great stairway of water from Minneapolis to Saint Louis through four projects authorized by Congress and carried out by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. These projects are known as the 4-, 4.5-, 6-, and 9-foot channel projects. These projects deepened the upper Mississippi one by one. The 1930 River and Harbor Act that authorized the 9-foot channel not only transformed the Mississippi into a navigable channel but also further established the Midwest as the world’s breadbasket.

The vast farmlands of the Midwest produced wheat, durum, flax, rye, oats, and barley. Railroads competed with Mississippi River barges, and it was this competition that ultimately drove the transformation of the river into a navigable channel. Construction of the Panama Canal in 1914 meant that crops and other Midwestern products could be transported down the Great River to even more international markets. This, along with the Twin Cities’ growth as an industrial and agricultural center, served as great motivation for changes to the river. Today, more than 10 million tons of cargo pass through locks and dams in the MNRRA corridor annually.

Viewed from Today
For nearly a century, the Mississippi River was valued mostly for its ability to create and sustain economic growth and our nation’s development. Cities and towns grew up on its banks. We used its waters and we tamed its rapids. Our story is intertwined with the Great River. It has shaped our nation in ways beyond those we could imagine when, as a newly formed country, we sent explorers to understand the farthest reaches of the river and the people who called it home.

Upper Saint Anthony Falls Lock and Dam, Stone Arch Bridge, and Minneapolis west-side mill district. Photo by Matthew Schillerberg, Trailheads Photography

Upper Saint Anthony Falls Lock and Dam, Stone Arch Bridge, and Minneapolis west-side mill district. Photo by Matthew Schillerberg, Trailheads Photography

Now we must ask, what will the 21st century mean for the Mississippi River? How will innovation in our generation shape America’s Great River in important ways?

History bears out the story of the use, and sometimes abuse, of the river’s economic capital. Perhaps as we write the story of the Mississippi River in the 21st century, it will be a story about the restorative capacity of the river and a generation’s action to maximize the economic, environmental, and community benefits of the river. MNRRA is uniquely positioned to interpret the power of the Mississippi River, thereby fostering community vision, engagement, and stewardship, and they are doing just that.

In the MNRRA corridor, the National Park Service is partnered with the Saint Anthony Falls Laboratory, which is the University of Minnesota’s world-renowned research center now making great strides in understanding and improving the river’s water quality; the Friends of the Mississippi River, which is preserving and restoring the river through land conservation, watershed protection, and river corridor stewardship; Great River Greening, which leads community-based restoration of natural and open spaces through native plantings, exotic species removal, prairie seed collection and sowing, and prescribed burns; the Saint Paul Riverfront Development Corporation, which is committed to redeveloping Saint Paul as a river-oriented community that balances the interdependence of economic, community, and environmental issues along the Mississippi; the University of Minnesota’s Telling River Stories Project, which is collecting the stories of urban riverfronts along the Mississippi River and the people in these river communities; the National Center for Earth-surface Dynamics, which is a National Science Foundation Science and Technology Center developing transformative management practices for ecosystems, resources, and land use; and numerous city, county, regional, and state agencies that plan, design, operate, and maintain the MNRRA corridor.

The Global Great River Partnership is also a project of MNRRA to collaborate with the University of Minnesota, the Science Museum of Minnesota, the National Science Foundation, and many other organizations to model how multiple organizations and stakeholders can work together to manage the Mississippi River based on the best scientific and economic models that recognize the value of natural and cultural resources. The Global Great River Partnership will share its knowledge with partners who manage other major rivers of the world, particularly those in densely populated areas.

This type of profound, deep, and direct experience on the river is a bit different from that of a river pilot in the 1860s, but it is as critical now as it was at any other time in history. As we seek to make connections to each other and to the river, we can see the stories that are emerging on the banks of the Mississippi River. What are you doing to orient yourself toward America’s Great River and anchor yourself in its future?

Julie Cutler, CIP, is a senior interpretive planner with the 106 Group, a cultural resources management, interpretive planning, and exhibit development firm located in Saint Paul, Minnesota. She lives along the Mississippi River in the Mississippi National River and Recreation Area.

Mark Carr, AEP River Operations

mjc-formalMark Carr works on public relations, government affairs, and safety communications at AEP River Operations in Chesterfield, Missouri.

What is RiverWorks Discovery?
RiverWorks Discovery is our river education program. We provide the foundation for positive community action for healthy, multiuse waterways by educating children and their families about the commerce, culture, and conservation of the great rivers and their watersheds. Our website is www.RiverWorksDiscovery.org.

We’re part of AEP River Operations, the second-largest dry-bulk carrier on the inland rivers. We handle grain, metals, construction materials, and coal. We have about 2,700 barges and about 70 towboats. We have about 1,600 employees, most of whom work on our towboats. Our people ride 24/7/365, in four-, three-, or two-week trips.

What is the scope of your education program?
RiverWorks Discovery addresses commerce, culture, and conservation education. It is easy to find clean water programs, but it is difficult to find programs on the culture and history of the rivers. And it is very difficult to find out about the history of commerce—what the Native Americans, the early settlers, or the people of the steamboat era moved, or what is currently moving on our waterways. When we started the program about four years ago, we made a conscious effort to talk about commerce, culture, and conservation, all interwoven into RiverWorks Discovery.

What are your objectives in providing these educational opportunities?
Our objectives are to promote community action, and there are a couple of ways that happens. One is through recognition, the appreciation when you see those commercial boats going by, whether they are barge freight, passenger vessels, or something else, that those are integral parts of the community, both from the jobs standpoint and looking backward through time. If you are looking at a fishing vessel, recognize that the Native Americans fished along there, the settlers fished along there.

RiverWorks Discovery’s mission on the cultural side is to help folks understand why towns are along the waterways in the first place. Even cities that don’t have a real maritime focus—like Spokane, Fort Collins, or Columbus—were settled because there was a steady supply of clean water. Generally, Native Americans had a settlement there, then the settlers came in and established their own villages.

It’s important to us that when policymakers are dealing with river issues, the public understands the issues and supports river use. That means locks, dams, and maintenance along the big rivers that support navigation and clean water. Our industry is heavily regulated for clean water, but people mistakenly think that the boats are dirty and pollute. In reality, shipping cargo by boat creates fewer air emissions and fewer fuel spills than rail or truck.

In general, what responsibility do you think that businesses have to provide this sort of education that you are talking about?
Perhaps not responsibilities, but certainly opportunities. If businesses want to be sure that the public understands them, they should use opportunities to talk to the public. If the public doesn’t understand them and they haven’t taken those opportunities, then it is not the public’s fault.

That is the situation we were in a few years ago in our industry. We had public policy issues that we were trying to address. The public didn’t understand our river industry and the policymakers didn’t understand us, either. So we took the opportunity to go out and talk to the public and talk to policymakers through this RiverWorks Discovery mechanism, and we think it is paying dividends for us. We think that people can understand us on a better level than if we just walked in with “PR-speak.” This is hands-on, real-world stuff that kids and families enjoy. Policymakers see that.

What are the venues for providing this information to the public?
We have a tent exhibit that we take out to community festivals, regattas, and school events, where kids can see the maps and images from our history. An interpreter talks about the cargo from past times and now. The kids have a clean rivers pledge that they can make. The interpreter will work with them on points like, if you are mowing the lawn and changing the oil in your lawnmower, don’t pour the dredge out on the grass because oil makes its way into our streams and rivers.

RiverWorks Discovery commissioned storyteller Susan Fowler to develop a story about the rivers and the lives of the people who work out there now. She works with fiber braiding and interprets songs. Kids play the different parts of the tow and the members of the crew. We’re delighted that Susan helps us; she’s phenomenal.

Our team built two 3-D puzzles: a side-wheeler from the steam era and a modern towboat. Each has about 20 pieces. These puzzles are displayed with illustrated banners so the kids can see a historic riverfront with the side-wheeler and a contemporary riverfront with the modern towboat. As the kids work the puzzles, the interpreter guides them through the concepts on the surrounding banners.

We also built a lock and dam toy that is made of heavy plastic and has water storage tanks and pumps. It pumps water into the upstream side of the dam. There’s a working dam and lock chamber. This thing is a pretty good size. It’s roughly eight feet long, four feet high, and a couple of feet wide. It holds about 60 gallons of water. The toy boats are roughly the size of a football. The kids learn quickly, usually before than their parents do. The kids can get in there, get wet, learn something, and have a good time. They can lock through going upstream or downstream, depending on how they control the dam and the lock chamber.

It sounds like most of what you were describing is geared towards children.
We developed our program for kids ages 7–12 because they are old enough to make judgments, think independently, and engage in activities, but they are young enough that our printed materials go home to their parents and grandparents. That was an important part of our community action goal—that adults engage in this community issue. We use our opportunity to get an important story to families.

What has the reaction been from the public since you began offering RiverWorks Discovery four years ago?
It has been pretty positive. We have done pre- and post-surveys and we have gotten qualitative feedback from attendees. We have gotten a lot of encouragement and a lot of positive evaluations. We have dealt with about 150,000 kids and families and it has pointed us in two directions. One direction we are exploring is making a more substantial museum exhibit that would travel around the country. We’d like to show RiverWorks Discovery to millions of people. Second, we may add high school programs. That could help us in policy issues and with making impressions on future employees.

Interpreting Rivers

by Paul Caputo

legacy-janfeb09This issue of Legacy focuses on the interpretation of rivers. At first glance, you might imagine that, because rivers are a natural feature, this issue would focus on natural heritage. But the opposite is the case. As authors proposed articles for this issue, it became abundantly clear that when we think of rivers, we don’t just think of the veins of rushing (or sometimes trickling) water that dissect our maps. We think of the people who lived along the shores, depending on rivers for sustenance, transportation, or whatever else affected their lives or livelihoods.

As Mark Carr of AEP River Operations points out in the profile, even most landlocked cities came into existence because there was access to clean water. Rivers are the lifeblood of the nation, and thus are home not only to unique and interesting natural habitats, but also to much of our cultural heritage.

Feature articles in this issue about America’s “Great River,” the Mississippi, and eastern Arkansas’s St. Francis River detail histories that weave through time the way the rivers themselves carve indelible, unpredictable marks on the landscape. These stories, “Navigating the Timeless Waters of the Upper Mississippi” by Julie Cutler on (posted February 2, 2009) and “A Meandering Memoir: A River’s Impact on Shaping the Arkansas Delta” by Mary Anne Parker, Debbie Van Winkle, and Shea Lewis (posted January 7, 2009), tell of a balancing act between man and nature that becomes, at times, more of a shoving match. Even a Visitor’s View about DeSoto National Wildlife Refuge in Iowa (posted February 16, 2009) tells not of the power and beauty of the Missouri River, but the unhappy fate of the steamboat Bertrand, which succumbed to one of a million dark obstacles and sank in 1865.

As always, I welcome your feedback.

Paul Caputo is the art and publications director for the National Association for Interpretation.