Ohio Valley Hist. Ass'n, Fifth Annual
Meeting. 79
main opponents. Clark to President Reed,
August 4, 1781, post, p.
Marshall advised the people to pay no
attention to the drafts ordered
for Clark and offered protection to
those who refused. He had told
Clark that while he could do nothing for
the expedition as an official
that as a private person he would give
every assistance within his
power. Penna Archives, 1781-1783,
p. 318.
71. See post, p.
72. See post, p.
73. See post, p.
74. Mich. Pioneer and Hist. Coll's., x,
p. 465.
75. Simon Girty to Major De Peyster, Mich.
Pioneer and Hist.
Coll's., pp. 478, 479. This rumor was started on account of the
expedi-
tion against the Delawares by Col.
Brodhead.
THE FUTURE OF NAVIGATION ON OUR WESTERN
RIVERS.
BY HON. ALBERT BETTINGER.
Stretching out between the Allegheny and
Rocky Mountain ranges
for a distance of 2,000 miles lies the
Mississippi Valley, containing three-
fifths of the area of the U. S. and more
than half our population. The
Mississippi River, rising in the
northern part of Minnesota and flowing
straight on to the Gulf of Mexico,
bisects this great valley, and in its
course forms the boundary line between
ten great states. From the
foothills of the Rockies in the
northwestern corner of the Valley, after
passing through the wheatfields of the
Dakotas and Nebraska, and
receiving many tributaries great and
small, comes the Missouri River,
entering the Mississippi a few miles
above St. Louis. Further down
this great central stream is met by the
Red, Arkansas, White and
Quachita Rivers, draining the
Southwestern portion of the Valley.
From the Northeast, running diagonally
through the State of Illinois,
the Illinois River meets the Mississippi
a short distance above St.
Louis-and great efforts, now in
progress, are soon to convert this
river into an effective connection with
the Great Lakes System at
Chicago.
The valley of the Mississippi is
politically and commercially more
important than any other valley on the
face of the globe. Here, more
than anywhere else will be determined
the future of the United States,
and, indeed, of the whole western world;
and the type of civilization
reached in this mighty valley, in this
vast stretch of country lying be-
tween the Alleghenies and the Rockies,
the Great Lakes and the Gulf,
80 Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.
will largely fix the type of
civilization for the whole western hemi-
sphere.
At the extreme Eastern end of the
valley, the Allegheny River,
rising in Pennsylvania and flowing North
through a portion of New
York, thence South, and the Monongahela
rising in West Virginia and
flowing North, unite here at the City of
Pittsburgh, where this celebra-
tion is being held, and form the Ohio
River which flowing for a dis-
tance of 1,000 miles in a general
southwesterly direction through the
center of the Valley which it drains,
after receiving thirteen navigable
tributaries, three from the North and
ten from the South, joins the
Mississippi at Cairo midway between St.
Paul and New Orleans, and
forming in its course the boundary lines
between six states. Fifty-
four rivers that are navigable by
steamboats and hundreds that are
navigable by barges, all contributing
their waters to the Mississippi,
are providentially so distributed over
this enormous territory as to
be accessible from all parts of it,
complete this great inland system of
waterways.
A description of this magnificent river
system is found in a
memorial presented to Congress by the
Ohio Valley States in 1872, that
will bear repetition here:
"To the development of a nation so
powerful as this now
is, and as its domains and its resources
foretell it will become,
the brain of the most sagacious rulers
could not have desired a
more complete and convenient system of
artificial internal water
communication with the whole interior,
than Nature presents for
man's perfecting hand; one better
designed to favor the inter-
change of the products of all sections,
or to carry those products
to the market of the world. In its
absence the statesman might
sigh in vain for its creation and the
people deplore, without re-
lief, its want."
After the young Republic had been fairly
established in the East
and the Star of Empire started on its
Westward course, it was on
the shores of these rivers, one after
another, that our fathers builded
their towns and cities and for
three-fourths of a century they con-
stituted the great highways of commerce.
The canoe of the Indian and of the
French explorers were suc-
ceeded by the sail and keel boats and
broadhorns of the American
pioneer.
The launching at this city of the
"New Orleans," the first steam-
boat, just 100 years ago, introduced a
new epoch, not only in the
further development of this valley, but
in the progress of the world.
A contemporaneous writer thus gives vent
to his enthusiasm over
the prospect which this new invention
opened up:
Ohio Valley Hist. Ass'n, Fifth Annual
Meeting. 81
"This plan if it succeeds must open
to view flattering pros-
pects to an immense country, an
interview of not less than two
thousand miles of as fine soil and
climate as the world can pro-
duce and to a people worthy of all the
advantages that nature and
art can give them. .....
. The immensity of country we
have yet to settle, the vast riches of
the bowels of the earth, the
unexampled advantages of our water
courses which wind without
interruption for thousands of miles, the
numerous sources of trade
and wealth opening to the enterprising
and industrious citizens, are
reflections that must arouse the most
dull and stupid. Indeed the
very appearance of the placid and
unbroken surface of the Ohio
invite to trade and enterprise."
The success of this new means of
navigation was soon established.
Rapidly the steamboats multiplied in
number, grew in size, power, com-
fort, safety and appearance. In the year
1840 there were built at Cin-
cinnati alone 33 steamboats aggregating
5,361 tons at a cost of $600,000.
In the same year 4,566 steamboats passed
Cairo. In 1841 between 400
and 500 steamboats from 75 to 785 tons
were navigating the Western
Rivers.
The entire steamboat tonnage employed in
the United States in
1842 was 219,994 tons, of which more
than half plied on our Western
rivers, Eastern ports being second and
the Great Lakes third in im-
portance.
The steamboat tonnage employed in the
Mississippi Valley at the
same time exceeded by 40,000 tons the
entire tonnage of the British
Empire. Four thousand flatboats were at
this time still employed in
moving the existing commerce.
Navigation kept even pace with the rapid
development of the
West until in 1860 our Western rivers
were teeming with steamboats
and barges. (Produce, machinery and an endless variety of manu-
factures were carried from the upper
Ohio to the South, and cotton,
sugar, rice and molasses were brought to
the mills and consumers of
the North. Iron ore was brought from
Missouri to the furnaces of
Ohio, Kentucky, West Virginia and
Pennsylvania, and coal was taken
back in return. A. great barge line
carried wheat and corn and flour
from St. Louis to New Orleans for
distribution through the south and
for export. Palatial steamers,
luxuriously equipped for travel, carried
millions of passengers up and down the
Ohio and Mississippi rivers.
The railroads then in operation acted
rather as feeders than as com-
petitors to the steamboat lines. Except
for intermittent seasons of
low water, river transportation seemed
adequate for the commercial
necessities of the West, supplemented by
inland lines of railroad.
But the extent and fertility of our
agricultural lands was so
great, the resources of our mines so
plentiful, the inventive genius
Vol. XXII -6.
82 Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.
of our people in creating machinery and
appliances for the increase
of our productions was so active, and
the energies of our rapidly multi-
plying population so persistent that
further extension of our trans-
portation facilities became a necessity,
and the railroad having proved
itself an efficient and reliable
carrier, we entered upon an era of rail-
road building.
In the thirty years from 1870 to 1900
our railroad mileage in-
creased from 52,922 miles to 194,262
miles. With the increase in rail-
road building came a decline of
transportation by river, notwithstand-
ing an enormous increase in the general
commerce of the country.
The decline was greatest in through
traffic, as from St. Louis to
New Orleans and from Pittsburgh and
Cincinnati to New Orleans, ex-
cept in coal. There has also been a
decline in many packet trades.
And all this in spite of the conceded
fact that the cost of transporta-
tion by water is about one-sixth of that
by rail.
What, then, are the causes for this
decline in transportation on
our Western rivers?
Much has been said and written
officially and otherwise upon this
subject and many causes have been
assigned, some purely local, others
far reaching in their effect. These are
well summarized in the Prelimi-
nary Report of the United States
National Waterways Commission,
Sixty-first Congress, Second Session,
which divided the advantages said
to be possessed by the railroad over the
river into two classes; one it
designates as inherent or fundamental,
the other as artificial or tem-
porary advantages. Those coming under
the first head are briefly stated
as follows:
1. The railway has a wider area of
distribution, can provide for
the receipt and delivery of freight in
car load lots at factories and
warehouses by means of switches. Can
reach all cities or towns alike,
whether located on water or not.
2. Railways are provided with facilities
at terminals for loading
and unloading.
3. The readier transfer of traffic from
one line to another, as
compared with transfer from water to
rail and vice versa, and the
practice of through billing and mutual
settlement of accounts. The
oscillation in river levels renders the
installation of adequate unload-
ing machinery more difficult.
Under the head of temporary or
artificial advantages, the Com-
mission enumerates as the
First and most important, the right of the railway to charge
lower
rates between points where its line is
in competition with water routes.
Second. The power of a railway to acquire steamboat lines or
enter into agreement with them for the
purpose of stifling water borne
traffic, either by operating the
steamboat lines or by discontinuing their
use upon competitive routes In both methods, the Commission states,
Ohio Valley Hist. Ass'n, Fifth Annual
Meeting. 83
that it, in the acquisition and
operation of steamboat lines in such
manner as not to compete with railways,
and in removing them en-
tirely from the field of competition,
the railway companies of the
country have been very active.
Third. The refusal of the railroads to prorate on through
routes
where naturally the freight would be
carried part by water and part
by rail. In many cases, the Commission
says, the route which apparently
is the natural one, would be by water
for three-fourths or more of the
distance, yet the charge for the
remaining railway haul is so considerable
as to render carriage by the longer haul
by water unprofitable.
Fifth. The better warehouse terminal and freight handling
equip-
ment of the railroads, while no progress
has been made on the water-
ways in the last 50 years in furnishing
modern facilities for the storage
or handling of freights.
To these causes the Board of Engineers
for Rivers and Harbors
in its report on the survey of the Ohio
River has added another which it
considers as the great cause of the
failure of waterways, but which it con-
cedes now no longer exists. It is that
heretofore the directions of water-
ways have not generally coincided with
commercial routes. That the
trend of commerce has been East and West
while our river systems
generally flow in a southerly direction.
It is now admitted, however, that the
commercial development
of the west has reached a point from
which future growth will be by
normal stages while the resources of
soil and climate and mineral of
the South and Southwest invite
development in which our internal
river system must play an essential
part.
A careful analysis of this assignment of
causes, I think will dis-
close but a single inherent advantage of
the railroad over the river,
and that is the ability of the railroad
to deliver freight in car load
lots direct to the warehouse or factory
by means of a switch. But
even this advantage is limited in the
case of each railroad line to the
factories and warehouses located on its
own line. If situated on an-
other line the delivery must be
accomplished by license of that other
line, a privilege that can, by proper
legislation, be made equally avail-
able to the shipper by river. The
disadvantage to the river is confined
to the necessity and cost of transfer
from the boat to the car, but
where water transportation is
uninterrupted by seasons of low water,
then transferring machinery and
appliances are or can be employed
which so reduce this cost that when
added to the lower freight rate
by water still leaves the advantage in
most cases with the river. In-
deed such transferring machinery, where
water transportation is re-
liable, as on the Great Lakes, has been
so perfected that railroads them-
selves employ it to effect transfers
from rail to water, thus making
the waterway an integral part of the
whole transportation system of
the country and lending to it the same
area of distribution that is pos-
84 Ohio Arch. and
Hist. Society Publications.
sessed by any one railroad line. The
error in ascribing to the rail-
road a greater area of distribution than
to the river route lies in
comparing the river route with the
railroad systems of the country
collectively, instead of limiting such
comparison to each railroad line
separately. Furthermore in crediting the railroad with ability to de-
liver in car load lots by switch to
factory or warehouse, the ability of
the river route to deliver entire barge
loads to the factory or ware-
house located on its banks, has been
overlooked.
Nor is the oscillation in river levels a
permanent or fundamental
disadvantage. Does not every railroad in
its course encounter similar
differences in levels which in many
instances it must overcome by the
employment of extra locomotive
power? What matters it whether
such difference in levels occurs during
or at the end of the journey?
The towering loading machinery at Lake
Erie ports overcome such
differences by hoisting entire railroad
cars and dumping their contents
into the holds of steamers and at a cost
which makes transfer from
rail to water profitable and hence
desirable.
It is confidently asserted that there
are but three conditions neces-
sary to give to commerce the full
benefit of the cheaper transportation
by water and these are:
1. To provide permanent channels of
adequate depth.
2. The co-operation of municipalities by
retaining and recovering
their public landings and either
erecting or affording opportunity to
erect suitable machinery and appliances
for the cheap handling of mer-
chandise freight to warehouses at the
top of the banks, there to be
transferred to railroad cars for further
transfer and to delivery wagons
for local consumption.
3. To provide by legislation for mutual
interchange of Bills of
Lading between river and rail routes and
for prorating of freights.
Let us consider these in their order.
From the beginning railroads have been
improving their road-
beds, by eliminating or reducing grades
and curves, putting on heavier
rails, perfecting their ballasting,
increasing the size of cars and motive
power and double tracking. They have
built feeders in all directions
and have succeeded in making the
railroad an efficient transportation
machine.
On the other hand, the river channel
which corresponds to the
roadbed of the railroad, has not been
effectively improved. The seasons
of low water are frequent and of long
duration, greatly increasing the
cost of transportation, and often
suspending navigation altogether. A
more or less desultory improvement of
rivers has long been in progress,
but until recently the efforts were
lacking in plan, policy and continuity
so that little progress has been made
toward the establishment of a
coherent reliable river system of
transportation and in consequence
navigation has continued to be
intermittent, uncertain and unreliable.
Ohio Valley Hist. Ass'n, Fifth
Annual Meeting. 85
The situation, however, at the present
time is more hopeful. The
Mississippi from Cairo to the Gulf with
small interruption has a
minimum depth of 9 feet. From Cairo to
the mouth of the Missouri
improvements to a depth of 8 feet are in
progress. From the mouth
of the Missouri to St. Paul the project
is for a depth of 6 feet. The
improvement of the Missouri as far up as
Kansas City has again been
taken up.
But by far the most important tributary
of the Mississippi River
is the Ohio River, which together with
its tributaries forms a consider-
able river system by itself.
The improvements now in progress on the
Ohio River contemplate
a complete canalization of the same to a
minimum depth of 9 feet by
construction of 54 locks and movable
dams, about thirty per cent. of
which is now completed and if the
expressed desires of President Taft
are carried out, will be entirely
completed in five years hence, but the
greater probability is that eight or
even ten more years will be required
for their completion. Nearly all the
tributaries of the Ohio have been
canalized or are in process of
canalization, but their real usefulness
awaits the completion of the Ohio. There
will then be in the Ohio
Valley alone a river system of 4,400
miles, and dependable water trans-
portation from the Pittsburgh district
as far west as Kansas City and
from St. Paul to the Gulf. Here at
Pittsburgh this great system is
to be connected by barge canal with Lake
Erie, which, when con-
summated will establish cheap and easy
water transportation between
the upper Ohio and the Great Lakes
System, and by way of the Erie
Canal, now approaching completion, with the Atlantic seaboard. If
these channels had been provided as the
railroads were being extended
and improved, river commerce would not
only have been maintained,
but would itself have contributed to a
still greater commercial develop-
ment than we have experienced. The
intermittent, unreliable and un-
certain navigation is the real, and
properly considered, the only cause
of the decline in water transportation.
Other contributing causes are
but the result of uncertain seasons of
navigation, and with dependable
channels would either have disappeared,
or would never have arisen
at all. Indeed, but for the distinct
advantages of cheapness, quick
delivery and unlimited capacity of water
transportation over that by
rail, not a vestige of river traffic
would be left. The survival of
packet lines on all our Western rivers,
and the development of coal
transportation lines unique in the
cheapness and volume of their de-
liveries, in spite of long and uncertain
seasons of suspension of naviga-
tion are positive proof of inherent
advantages of river transportation.
No railroad line similarly handicapped
could survive the competition of
its rivals.
Nor is it correct to attribute any
portion of the decline to crude-
ness of the steamboat or to lack of
thrift of steamboat men or man-
86 Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.
agers, as is so often done. The
steamboat in its type, motive power,
tackle, equipment and accommodations,
has been constantly improved
to take full advantage of the
intermittently navigable river channels.
Alternating conditions of low and high
water, swift currents, float-
ing ice, fogs, faulty disposition of
bridge piers and of low bridges
and other obstructions have kept alive a
spirit of improvement which
has produced steamboats thoroughly
adapted to present conditions, not
only for their safe navigation, but for
the handling of freight aboard
ship as well as for receiving and
discharging. The balance rudder, a
clever device for the more effective
control of the boat, and the steam
capstan now in use all over the world,
were first introduced on the
Ohio river. The railroads have by no
means surpassed the steamboat
in the manner of handling merchandise
freight. They have not even kept
pace with the steamboat. In fact, the
greater portion of this class of
freight, if not all, is handled by the
shipper or receiver himself each
in his own way and with the means
available to him.
Two citations from reputable trade
journals might be quoted in
support of this statement. The
Engineering News in a recent article
(Jan'y 5th, 1911) stated:
"All admit that our present methods
of freight handling are
crude; they are no better than they were
50 years ago, while not
nearly so cheap."
The Electric World some time since
called attention to the same
fact as follows:
"The present system of handling
miscellaneous freight at
terminal stations is absurdly slow and
expensive as compared
with the progressive methods in other
branches of railroad man-
agement."
As to the second essential condition to
bring about a revival of
river commerce, it should be said that
during the period of ascendency
of the railroad and the corresponding
decadence of river traffic, the
railroads have been systematically,
especially within municipal limits, en-
croaching on the river bank and in many
instances actually occupying
the public landings in such manner as to
hinder and handicap their
joint use with steamboat
transportation-and it is at these points where
local deliveries must be cheapened and
economical connection between
steamboat and railroad must be effected.
So thoroughly is the necessity
for such co-operation between
municipalities and the general govern-
ment recognized that Congress has in
some instances made appropria-
tions for river improvement conditioned
thereon. The same reason
obtains for such co-operation on the
part of municipalities on inland
waters as induced the City of New York
and other sea ports to pro-
vide municipal docks. The City of New
Orleans owns its river front
Ohio Valley Hist. Ass'n, Fifth Annual Meeting. 87
and has constructed extensive wharves
and is now engaged in estab-
lishing a complete connection between
steamboat, steamship and rail
lines by the construction of a municipal
belt railroad. San Francisco,
Portland, Oregon, Seattle, Cleveland and
Buffalo have done some ex-
cellent work along this line. Who can
doubt that municipal ownership
and maintenance of public landings and
terminals is less appropriate
or less beneficial to the public
generally than the opening and mainte-
nance of the streets leading to them?
Mr. Herbert Knox Smith, Commissioner of
Corporations of the
Department of Commerce and Labor, has
excited general interest
throughout the country in this question
by an exhaustive report of
three volumes on Transportation by
Water, and by his announcement
that terminals are as important as
channels.
The National Waterways Commission
already referred to like-
wise recommended:
"That improvement in rivers and
harbors be not made unless
sufficient assurance is given that
proper wharves, terminals and
other necessary adjuncts to navigation
shall be furnished by munici-
pal or private enterprise, and that the
charges for their use shall
be reasonable."
This does not apply to bulk freight,
such as coal, sand, brick,
stone, cement, lumber, timber and
specialized traffic which is handled at
private wharves, all of which are
already equipped with excellent han-
dling machinery for ready transfer
between rail and water, and it is
safe to say that with dependable
channels even these will be more
highly improved.
The third condition, that of enforcing
mutual interchange of
bills of lading and pro-rating of
freight charges between rail and
water routes, must be provided by
amendment of the interstate com-
merce law. The power to refuse to honor
through bills of lading
issued by water routes or to issue such
bills over water routes and to
pro-rate on freights is the strongest
weapon in the hands of the rail-
roads to suppress water competition.
There was another weapon very generally
and effectively em-
ployed by the railroads, namely, the
power to reduce rates between
competitive points below the actual cost
of transportation, and, when
the suppression of the water competitor
was accomplished, to restore
the regular tariff, recouping itself in
the meantime by charging a higher
rate on the traffic not affected by the
water route. To correct such
unfair competition, Congress, upon the
recommendation of the National
Waterways Commission, passed an Act
providing that when a railroad
reduces its rates in competition with a
water route, the same shall not
again be raised except by permission of
the Interstate Commerce Com-
88 Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.
mission, on good cause shown other than
the effort to crush out com-
petition.
The refusal of railroad lines to deal
with steamboat lines the
same as they do with each other as to
through billing and pro-rating
must be met with similar legislation,
and accordingly all official re-
ports dealing with the subject and the
National Rivers and Harbors
Congress have recommended to the
Congress of the United States the
enactment of such a law, and it is
believed that Congress will in the
near future carry out these
recommendations.
This will not be done in hostility to
the railroads, but in obedi-
ence to a broad economic law that the
prosperity of the country is
largely measured by the efficiency of
its transportation facilities. Nor
does the development of our river
traffic in the end operate adversely
to the welfare of the railroad, for the
world is full of examples con-
clusively showing that railways and
waterways operated side by side,
each performing the functions best
suited to it, conduce to the prosperity
of each other and to that of the people
at large.
Having considered the causes of the
decline of river commerce
in the Mississippi Valley and pointed
out what may be done for their
removal let us take a peep into the
future, to see, if we can, what
we may fairly expect of our new and
permanent channels, and of the
establishment of harmonious relations
between river and rail traffic
and the co-operation of localities. In
making this forecast, however,
neither the volume nor character of the
traffic carried in the halcyon
days of steamboating will aid us.
Revival of river commerce does not
necessarily mean recovery of the kind of
commerce lost. We must
view the question in the light of the
new development. The popula-
tion of the Mississippi Valley in 1870
was 21,154,291; in 1910 it was
51,196,846. Productive energy has
increased in proportion. The Mis-
sissippi Valley produces the greater
part of the country's food stuffs;
two-thirds of our manufacturing
interests are located here, and nearly
all the country's coal supply is drawn
from the Mississippi Valley. The
demand for transportation is
tremendous. All these things must be
transported, not once, but many times
and in many forms. In times
of ordinary prosperity the railroads are
not equal to the task. No
matter how well equipped, they have
their limitations as to carrying
capacity.
The Interstate Commerce Commission has
expressed this view in
the following statement:
"It may conservatively be stated
that the inadequacy of trans-
portation facilities is little less than
alarming; that its continua-
Ohio Valley Hist. Ass'n, Fifth Annual
Meeting. 89
tion may place an arbitrary limit on the
future productivity of the
land; and that the solution of the
difficult financial and physical
problems involved is worthy the most
earnest thought and effort
of all who believe in the full
development of our country and the
largest opportunity for its
people."
Hon. Elihu Root, while Secretary of
State, in a public address de-
scribed the situation thus:
"We have come to a point where the
railroads of the country
are unable to perform that function
which is necessary to con-
tinued progress in the increase of our
national wealth. Conditions
are such that there is no human
possibility that railroads can
keep pace with the necessities of our
natural production for the
transportation of our products, and the
one avenue that is open
for us to keep up our progress is the
avenue of water transporta-
tion." (Root, p. 17, N. R. and H.
C., 1907.)
One other distinguished authority, Mr.
James J. Hill, with charac-
teristic forcefulness, and with special
reference to our western rivers,
in 1908 spoke as follows:
"What this country now wants of the
waterway is assistance
in carrying a volume of traffic grown
too large, in times of national
prosperity, for the railroads to handle
with their present trackage
and terminals. Heavy freights along main
lines can profitably
go by water. The traffic of the country
will need, as soon as
normal conditions are restored, all the
assistance that waterways
can give. The future of the waterway is
assured, not so much as
a competitor, but as a helper of the
railroad. ... You cannot
find a man eminent in railroading today
who is not also an ardent
advocate of waterways improvement."
One other distinguished authority on
transportation, Prof. Emery R.
Johnson, is worth citing. He says:
"The services that inland waterways
are to perform in the
future will differ from those they have rendered in the past.
Both the railroads and the waterways of
the future are destined
to be more effective transportation
agents than they have been in
the past. Although the railroad has
reached a higher degree of
efficiency and has by no means reached
the end of its technical de-
velopment, the usefulness of inland
waterways as a part of the
general transportation system of the
country will not cease to be
important. Indeed, the value of inland
waterways will tend to
increase with the advance of our country
in population and in-
dustry. The development of facilities
for public carriage has be-
come increasingly important, and our
industries will require both
90 Ohio Arch. and Hist. Society Publications.
rail and water carriers for the adequate
performance of the ever-
enlarging work of transportation."
The carrying capacity of the river is
unlimited. Wherever freight
is to be moved in great quantities,
barges are employed, which, with
their towboats, constitute the cheapest
form of freight carriers. At
the appearance of the first rise in
September last, within a day or two,
250,000 tons of coal and manufactured
iron left the city of Cincinnati
and Louisville, and without interference
with the regular traffic. To
move this quantity of freight by rail
would require 5,896 cars of 45
tons each, made up in 196 trains of 30
cars each. No railroad, how-
ever well equipped, could have performed
this service without inter-
ference with its regular traffic inside
of sixty days, to say nothing of
its inability to assemble such a
quantity of traffic at either terminus.
It is not only in carrying capacity, but
in quick delivery, that
the steamboat outclasses the railroad in
most cases-though popular
conception is to the contrary. The Interstate Commerce Commission
reports the average movement of a
freight car per day as 23 miles.
The immense body of freight just
referred to was delivered at Louis-
ville, a distance of 598 miles, in four
or five days.
An ordinary packet boat will average 120
miles per day, including
all stops and receiving and discharging
of freight. One of the Pitts-
burgh and Cincinnati Packet Line boats
will deliver 800 tons of miscel-
laneous cargo from Pittsburgh to Cincinnati, a distance of 468
miles,
in sixty hours, which would not
ordinarily be accomplished by any of
the railroads running between these
points short of six days.
These conditions must attract a vast
amount of transportation to
the river at all times, and in seasons
of great prosperity, when great
freight movement is required, will
surely avert a recurrence of the
congestions of 1906 and 1907. The relief
to be afforded at such times by
our navigable rivers to immediately
contiguous territory will be felt
throughout the land.
The gasoline engine has produced a new
kind of boat which
has recently come into use throughout
the whole extent of our river
system, which promises to be an
important factor in the future of river
commerce. This is the gasoline packet
and towboat. It measures from
15 to 40 tons, operates in short trades
of from 15 to 50 miles. Its
original cost and expense of operation
are small. It carries the farmer
and his products to the nearest market
town, often towing one or two
small barges. These packets are the
trolley lines on the river, and,
like their counterparts on land, are
destined to perform a distinct and
important function in the economy of
transportation.
But it is our firm belief that passenger
travel on our new channels
will be quite as great as the freight
movements. Travel on our Western
rivers has ever been popular-even at
this day every packet boat relies
Ohio Valley Hist. Ass'n, Fifth Annual
Meeting. 91
on its passenger list to preserve the
equilibrium of its cash account. A
fine line of side-wheel boats has always
been maintained between Cin-
cinnati and Louisville; and who has not
heard of those magnificent
double-deckers, the United States and
America, that nightly carried great
cabins full of happy travellers between
those two cities, until one night
a disastrous collision brought a
brilliant career to a tragic ending.
But a permanently navigable river which
admits of deeper draft
than is now permissible will quickly
replace the wooden inflammable
craft of today by a steel constructed
vessel, so comfortably and elegantly
appointed, so safe, fleet and smooth of
movement, through river scenery
of matchless beauty, gratifying every
choice of distance and direction,
as cannot fail to appeal to our people.
Not that the hurrying commercial
traveler will choose this method
for making five or six towns a day, but
it will be sought by that great
body of leisurely travelers, the product
of our unparalleled national
prosperity, which moves like a solid
phalanx on our coast and lake re-
sorts in summer time, and like an army
of occupation invades our
Southern States in winter; for whose
comfort and enjoyment great
fleets of luxuriantly equipped
greyhounds are speeding from ocean to
ocean and from shore to shore.
Another new and potent factor in the
future commerce of our
Western rivers is the Panama Canal.
Through its open gates the Ohio
and Mississippi Valleys will have direct
water connection with the
west coast of South America, our own
Pacific Coast, and the harbors
of the Orient. The largest share of
American-made goods that will
seek these markets will come from the
workshops and mills of the
Mississippi Valley. The greatest
beneficiary of this new commercial
roadstead will be the Mississippi
Valley.
AMERICAN INTERESTS IN THE PACIFIC.
BY HOMER B. HULBERT, F. R. G. S.
When the founders of our Republic chose
the eagle as the
symbol of our national life, they did
not have in mind its carniv-
orous nature nor its predatory habit.
They saw in it the only living
creature that could see the farthest and
that could climb the highest
into the blue. There was in this choice
some predetermination of Provi-
dence; for three hundred years ago when
this continent was, like an-
cient Chaos, without form and void,
there appeared on the Atlantic sea-
board a little fringe of Anglo-Saxons
who never dreamed that they
were an empire in embryo; but
there, already was the eagle's egg.