Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I, Part 39

Author: Stevens, Walter Barlow, 1848-1939
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: St. Louis, Chicago, The S. J. Clarke publishing company
Number of Pages: 1074

USA > Missouri > Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I > Part 39

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men say that it was no uncommon thing to hear the exhaust of those pioneer steamboats ten or twelve miles. The whistles carried much farther. Long stops and much use of the whistle to give notice of the coming of the boat was the practice before the days of the telegraph. The slow rate of speed, two or three miles an hour. the sinuous course of the Osage and the reverberations of the caves and cliffs added enough illusions to warrant credence for this tradition of the Osage.

Long after the first steamboat came up the Missouri, a tradition preserved in Cedar township told how one of the pioneers hearing the whistle shouted® to his wife: "Old woman hurry up and wash and dress the children,-quick. That was sartinly Old Gabriel tootin' his horn. Git ready! Git ready !"

A steamboat which became famous for its whistle was the Boreas. The settlers in northeast Missouri called it "the Screamer." Judge Fagg said in his Pike county recollections : "I have been on the prairie near Bowling Green and heard her at Louisiana, twelve miles, and have heard her from Blue Lick Knob when she was at Clarksville, ten miles on an air line."

Captain Joseph Brown in his steamboat reminiscences, told to the Missouri Historical Society, said :

"I could stand on the levee any night and tell almost any boat either by the sound of her escapement or the sound of her bell, long before she reached the landing. Indeed, owing to the peculiar construction of the heaters of the engines, the escapement was such that hardly any two were alike, and many of them could be heard for miles. One in par- ticular, I remember, the Boreas, could be heard scream for twelve or fifteen miles on a clear night, while others had a heavy, deep sound or growl, the Hannibal, a big New Orleans boat, being of the latter kind. The engines of the Boreas, when she was wrecked, were taken out and sent to Chanwan, Mexico, and put into a silver mine to do pumping duty. It was said that they answered a double purpose, as they made such a hideous noise that they frightened all the wild beasts and even the Indians away for many miles around."

The first steamboat up the Mississippi, to ascend above Louisiana, was the General Putnam. It was long remembered by the pioneers of the northeastern part of Missouri,-a sternwheeler without cabin and with one smokepipe. The Putnam carried an outfit of axes. At frequent intervals the boat was run to the bank and the crew cut wood. More than a week was required to make the trip from St. Louis to the mouth of Fever river.

Missouri River Traditions.

The Spread Eagle had the picture of a large eagle on each wheelhouse, with the words, "E Pluribus Unum." Captain Ben Johnson was called upon at Missouri river landings to tell "what them words meant." His usual transla -. tion was "Every tub stands on its own bottom."

The Keystone attempted to go up the Kaw river during high water in the fifties, the captain intending to make Fort Riley with his cargo of military supplies. He missed the channel and got aground on a Kansas prairie where the boat was left high and dry as the flood went down. Later in the season the Indians set fire to the grass and burned the boat.

When the Polar Star made the trip from St. Louis to St. Joseph in two days and twenty hours, the delighted business men of the latter city presented to ,

CAPTAIN WILLIAM W. GREENE

CAPTAIN JOHN N. BOFINGER

"THE HARP OF A THOUSAND SPRINGS"

Submarine wrecking boat designed by James B. Eads. Used before the Civil War to salvage sunken steamboats and their cargoes

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Captain Tom Brierly a large pair of elk horns tipped with silver. The captain fastened the horns in front of the pilot house with a streamer, "Beat our time and take our horns-St. Louis to St. Joseph, 2 days and 20 hours."

The Pontiac with 700 barrels of whiskey was sunk at Smith's bar and is supposed to be buried deep in the sand two miles from the present channel.

It is a tradition of the Missouri river in the days when as many as twenty steamboats arrived at St. Joseph in a single day, that a loaded boat on the Missouri would draw two inches less than in the Ohio, due to the silt carried in the former stream.

Holcombe's researches satisfied him that Missouri interpreted from an Indian language does not mean "Big Muddy." The river takes its name from the tribe which lived along the banks. And this tribe, according to Holcombe, was called by the Illinois Indians in their speech. "The Missouris," meaning "The People Who Use Wooden Canoes."

"I have heard Joe Kinney, Captain Joe, say that he made $50,000 profit on one trip from St. Louis to Fort Benton and return with his boat, the steamer Cora, a Missouri river packet," Dr. W. L. Campbell, the Kansas City local his- torian told. "She was a sidewheeler and the top of her left wheelhouse was painted green. She sank off Bellefontaine Bend, and they called it Cora Chute after that. Cora Kinney, the captain's daughter married Dr. Hurt, a physician down at Boonville. Another boat was the Columbian of the St. Louis and Omaha Packet company. She used to put off freight at the levee here. Cap- tain Barns was her commander, and his long beard used to blow out in the wind. She was a big sidewheeler and went down at Buckhorn bar off the mouth of the Grand river, near Brunswick."

When the Luella came down the Missouri in the fall of 1886, Captain Grant Marsh brought 230 miners and $1,250,000 in gold dust.

A Thrill on the Missouri.

In his autobiography, Calvin Smith tells of this incident which came under his observation on a Missouri river steamboat before the Civil war:

"The first day out a number of sharpers started card and dice games on the deck. They kept this up until we got to Boonville, and many dropped down from the cabin to look on or take a hand. We left Boonville late at night and jogged along the river. Just at daybreak one man who had been playing with the sharpers leaned back to where his wife was sleeping, with her four or five little girls cuddled up close to her, and said : 'Anna, I have lost all my money.' The wife jumped up and although only clad in one undergarment, which barely reached to the calves of her legs, she at once ran to where the gamblers were playing. She grabbed the sweat cloth, the faro box, dice box, cards, etc., all of the money, paper, gold, and silver. This was quite a large amount, as it included not only the winnings but the capital. She quickly ran to the forecastle, then upstairs to the clerk's room. The clerk happened to be in, so the woman said: 'Here, take this. They have won all our money. We have not paid our fare, nor for the freight.'

"The clerk quickly obeyed orders and put the whole bundle in the safe. One of the head gamblers, who had followed the woman, got there just in time to see the money put in the safe. He at once demanded the return of his money, both from the woman and the clerk, using furious oaths. The husband of Anna had followed, and the gambler drew a big knife and flashed it in his face and drew it across his throat while with the most furious of oaths he demanded the return of his money. The clerk saw that war Vol. 1-23

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was declared, and, as the steward was just passing. the clerk told him to call the captain. As soon as the captain came to the clerk's office, the woman commenced telling him: 'It was all the money they had in the world and that they had not paid their freight or passage.' The gambler tried to explain but the woman kept repeating, 'It was all the money they had.' Her tongue ran like a bell clapper repeating the same thing over and over again. The gambler only asked for a fair settlement and to get back his own money, but he could not be heard on account of the woman.

"The captain stepped forward to the boiler deck and tapped the bell for the pilot to land the boat on the starboard side. He was followed by the woman with her almost naked children. Some of them had on torn slips, but they all had but little covering. As it was warm weather in June, this did not hurt them any. They clung to the few articles of clothing their mother had on. In the meantime the captain had ordered the mate to take two sailors and bring the yawl around to the starboard side. When this had been done the captain ordered the mate to bring up four or five deckhands to the boiler deck. Then the captain said, 'Take these two men and put them ashore.' The mate had a long bamboo pole, about six feet in length, and he flourished it as he ordered the two gamblers to march. I could not help but laugh as the deck-hands pointed to the naked little girls as the gamblers marched past.

"Down in the forecastle one of the gamblers said to a friend, 'Have our boxes and trunks put off at the next town . above.' This was Lexington. I watched the gamblers as they marched through the grass and weeds up toward Glasgow, which was about six or seven miles up the river. When we passed that place I saw nothing of the two gamblers. Next night at nine o'clock when we reached the place where the gamblers' goods were to be put off I heard their friend tell the warehouse man that they would be called for by two men.

"Next morning we were at Liberty Landing and the man who had lost all of his money was attending to the putting off of the boxes, barrels, bedsteads, lots of bundles of clothing and other things like emigrants usually carry. The clerk called Anna, the man's wife, to come to his office. When she went there he handed her a bundle made of the veritable sweat cloth such as the gamblers used in the game the night before and a receipt for sixteen dollars for freight and passage. He also assisted her in getting the children ashore and helped with her bundles.

"The gentleman who put off the freight of the gamblers near Lexington said after- wards that the gamblers told him they lost over $100 of their own over and above what they had won up to the time of leaving."

Some of the Missouri Commodores.

The possibilities of steamboating in the St. Louis trade brought to the city many strong men. William Wallace Greene, a native of Marietta, Ohio, a de- scendant of the Rhode Island Greenes of Revolutionary fame, was a successful steamboatman on the Ohio. In partnership with his father-in-law, Captain Joseph H. Conn, of Cincinnati, he built the Cygnet. Captain Conn and Cap- tain Greene brought the Cygnet to St. Louis in 1834 and became residents here, operating several boats and carrying on a commission business as Conn, Sprigg & Greene. Captain Greene was one of a number of St. Louis steamboatmen who were not only strictly moral but earnestly religious. He was a ruling elder in the Presbyterian church.

One of the most benevolent of the men who amassed fortunes in the river trade was Captain Richard J. Lockwood, who came from Delaware in 1830. He was a resident of St. Louis forty years. One of his acts of benevolence was the contribution of $20,000 for the building of an Episcopal church in 1866.

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While Henry D. Bacon was on the river he became famous for his strict observance of the Sabbath. One of the boats he commanded was the Hannibal. Wherever midnight of Saturday found the Hannibal, Captain Bacon went to the bank and tied up until the same hour Sunday night.

The McCune family came from Pennsylvania originally, migrating first to Bourbon county, Kentucky, and later in 1817 to Missouri. John S. McCune, after doing business some years along the upper Mississippi river, came to St. Louis in 1841. The impressions he had received from his earlier experience prompted him to organize what became in the palmy days of steamboating one of the most important transportation interests of St. Louis. Long before the railroads, Commodore McCune had in operation the Keokuk Packet company. Up to that time the steamboat men had not appreciated the economies and the advantages of operation in companies. A great deal of the river business was done by individual owners of boats or by single firms. Commodore McCune put on the river a fleet of six boats which ran on regular schedules between St. Louis and Keokuk, furnishing facilities for all intermediate cities and towns. The boats were so far superior to most of the steamboats between 1840 and 1855 that conservative river men predicted a collapse. Commodore McCune and those associated with him garnered fortunes on their enterprise. In 1857 the Pilot Knob Iron company was in danger of going down. To raise money the stockholders proposed to give as collateral to eastern capitalists a very large amount of the stock for a loan of $300,000. Commodore McCune came forward and advanced the money, taking the presidency of the iron com- pany. That was one of the acts which went far to establish at an early date the financial independence of St. Louis.

Two Illinois boys, born in the southernmost county of that state, sons of an Irish father and a Scotch mother, came to St. Louis to seek fortune. They found it in steamboating. They became river captains of the best type. Barton Able and Daniel Able began as clerks on the Ocean Wave. They were two of the best known men of St. Louis. They were "Bart" Able and "Dan" Able. It was said of Dan Able that in his many years of steamboating not a life was lost on any boat commanded by him. In 1851 he made a trip that is historic, taking the "Anthony Wayne" 160 miles up the St. Peters, now known as the Minne- sota river, the first steamboat navigation of that river. He also took the Wayne up the Mississippi above St. Paul to St. Anthony, making another new record.

Decline of the Traffic.

Traffic by river began its decline soon after the Civil war. In 1866 there were fifty-one steamers running from St. Louis to the Upper Missouri. The next year there were seventy-one. In 1868 the decline began. There were sixty-two steam- boats in the Upper Missouri trade from St. Louis. In 1869 the decline was more apparent for the number of boats was reduced to thirty-seven. In 1870 the number came down to nine.

In the palmy days fifty steamboats ran regularly from St. Louis up the Missouri. In the times of heavy immigration this number was largely increased. There was first class passenger traffic as well as travel of emigrants going west- ward and of freight. Some of the Missouri river boats were, if not so large, as

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finely finished and equipped as the "floating palaces" on the Mississippi. The Morning Star, the Ben Lewis, the Polar Star and F. X. Aubrey, named for the man who had made the wonderful ride from Independence to Santa Fe, the Cataract. the Meteor and the New Lucy, were favorites with first class travel. Before the Civil war these boats carried as many as 200 cabin passengers on a trip. They had crews of twenty negro waiters dressed in spotless white and they served meals equal to the best hotel bills of fare. The James H. Lucas was a record breaker. This boat made the trip from St. Louis to St. Joseph in two days and twelve hours. For freight from St. Louis to Fort Benton the charge was fifteen cents a pound.

In 1879 the revival of "mountain trade" by way of the Missouri river was attempted. Three boats, the Dakota, the Wyoming and the Montana, were built especially for the proposed mountain service. They proved to be too large, could not compete with the railroads and came into the possession of Captain Jenkins and the Keiths. The new owners pluckily attempted to secure the lost trade between St. Louis and Kansas City and intervening points. Low freight rates by the railroad and high insurance on the boats defeated them. '

The value of the steamboats registered or controlled at . St. Louis in 1871 was $5.428,800. Probably the most ambitious consolidation of steamboat inter- ests was attempted at St. Louis just after the close of the war. The Atlantic and Mississippi Steamship company was organized. It owned a fleet of twenty- eight of the finest boats on the western rivers. Leading spirits in the enterprise were the Scudders, John J. Roe, the Ames family, the Ables, John N. Bofinger and several other St. Louisans with a few stockholders from the Ohio. The stock was $2,500,000. If the South had not been so impoverished, if recovery had been rapid as expected, the consolidation might have been successful. Cap- tain Joseph Brown said of the collapse :

"The Atlantic and Mississippi Steamship company was organized in 1866, after the war, and owned 28 steamers, most of which were 300 or more feet long. They plied between St. Louis and New Orleans. In fifteen months that company lost fifteen of the twenty- eight, either by explosion or sinking, and with no insurance. I was made president of the company after these disasters, and remedied the evils to some extent, but the company's back was broken. Inside of two years I was instructed to sell out at auction the balance of the boats, eleven in number. While no one but the stockholders lost any money, it fell hard on them, for out of $70,000 that I had in stock I only got $2,600."

The White and Its Curves.

From its four heads in Boston mountains to Batesville, where it leaves the Ozarks and enters the lowlands, White river is a succession of astonishing curves. No other river on the continent so nearly and so frequently doubles upon itself. From the source to the flat country is a distance on a straight line of perhaps 150 miles. White river between these points has a course of over 600 miles ; some estimates make it 1,000 miles.

The beginning is in the western part of Arkansas, near the Oklahoma line. The water runs toward all points of the compass in quick succession many times before it adopts a comparatively direct course to the Mississippi. From the Boston mountains the general course, with many a bend and curve, is north-

POSSIBILITIES OF RIVER TRANSPORTATION Six trainloads of cotton on a St. Louis steamboat

CROSSING WHITE RIVER IN THE OZARKS

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ward and northeastward into Missouri. Probably the highest point in this direction is Forsyth, near the center of Taney county. From this place the White wriggles its way back into Arkansas and down through Marion county, to where the Buffalo joins it. But not until the Missouri-Arkansas border has been crossed seven times does the uncertain stream finally bear away to the southeastward to stay.

Adding to the marvel of White river's eccentric meanderings are the walls of rock which tower from 200 to 500 feet often from the water edge. A bird's- eye view from above would show the river deep set in a canyon of continuous and often sharp curvatures. A mile of river in a straight line is unusual. The canyon-like valley of the White narrows in places almost to the channel's width. Over most of the course it is wide enough for a strip of fertile bottom land along the river.

The water wanders from one side of the valley to the other. It washes the base of the towering palisades first on the right and then on the left. It main- tains close relationship with a cliff for half a dozen miles. Then it suddenly crosses through the bottom lands and hugs the opposite frowning pass. On a bright day a stretch of the winding river seen from a summit of the palisades shimmers, like well-polished silver. "White" aptly describes the appearance. A nearby view from the banks reveals a degree of purity which is not equaled by any other western river outside of the Ozarks. The contrast of comparison with the streams which flow through alluvial country is striking. White river has its origin in mountain springs. Numberless underground channels in the limestone strata help to swell the volume. Tributaries vary from tiny rivulets starting high up on the benches of the mountains to powerful streams which gush forth with a roar from beneath the shelves of overhanging rock. Twenty miles below Forsyth, beside the White, is McGill spring, which pours out from the face of the cliff a body of water strong enough to run a large mill. It is a type of hundreds, while the smaller and unnamed springs can only be enumerated by thousands.

Navigating the White.

Many years ago Forsyth was reached by steamboats on White river. The bold navigators pushed their sternwheelers to the foot of the rapids. Then they sent the roustabouts clambering over rocks and among the trees, dragging the towline its full length. The upper end was strongly fastened to stand the strain. The boat end of the hawser was wound around the capstan. With the paddle wheeis driven by every pound of pressure available, and with the donkey engine winding in the towline, the boat dragged and pushed itself up foot by foot through the foaming rapids. After the passage was made a long reach of smooth, deep water made easy progress for perhaps twenty, perhaps fifty miles. In this way Forsyth was reached. And when the boat, "loaded to the guards" with lead and cotton and hogs and the various productions of the White river country, turned her head downstream, there was little to do except trust to Providence and the nerve of the man behind the pilot wheel. The current did the rest.

But the railroads built into South Missouri. The Ozark people took to rais-

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ing less cotton and more corn, which they fed to live stock that could be driven overland to railroad points north. The inducements for river transportation to and from Forsyth became smaller. One day, in a spirit of daring, Capt. Bateman said he was going to take the Mary C. to Forsyth if it was her last trip. He made McBee's and the other landings above Buffalo City, and tri- umphantly awoke the echoes of the heights of Pine mountain as the boat came in sight of Forsyth. But pride went before the worst fall that could happen to a steamboatman. In trying to turn the Mary C.'s head downstream, the cap- tain failed to gauge the width of the channel. He "ran her nozzle ag'in the bank" on one side. The stern went around with a sweep and lodged against a gravel bar on the other side. The Mary C. lay for a few moments broadside in the channel, blocking it. There was creaking and groaning. The hog chains parted. The Mary C.'s back was broken. The wreck lay there until the ele- ments wore it to pieces which floated away. That was the end of navigation to Forsyth.

The most important tributary to the White above Forsyth is the James. It joins from the Missouri side, and is wholly within this state. Its character is very like that of the White and the other branches. Two points in Stone county, Galena and Marvel Cave, are joined by a ridge road eighteen miles long. James river also connects these two points, but runs 125 miles in its crooked course to do so. With the James added, the White becomes at Forsyth a river in more than name. When it is "up" the ferry is the only means of crossing. In low stages the stream is fordable at the "riffles." The long reaches of still water are many feet in depth.

Pioneer Water Power.

On a branch of the Femme Osage creek in St. Charles county, Jonathan Bryan built a water mill. This, according to tradition, was the first use made of water power in Missouri outside of St. Louis. The mill is said to have been built in 1801. It would grind from six to ten bushels of grain in the course of a day and a night. The early settlers at St. Charles, on Loutre Island and between depended on the Bryan mill for their flour and meal. Bryan used the same stones to grind the wheat and the corn. He sifted the flour in a box by hand. The creek upon which the mill was located was fed by a spring. Bryan had such confidence in the operation of his plant that he filled the hopper with corn in the morning and went about other work. He gave his attention to the mill only as it was necessary to refill the hopper and to empty the basin. In this way the mill ran continuously through the twenty-four hours. From the stones the meal and flour dropped into a large basin on the floor. About a mile from this mill Daniel Boone was living with his son Nathan. The Boones had a dog they called Cuff. This dog found an opportunity in Bryan's absence from the mill. He went there and licked the meal out of the basin. When Cuff was especially hungry and the meal did not run from the stones fast enough to suit him he would bark. In this way Bryan learned the defect in his system. He discarded the basin and used a large coffee pot, the top of which was too small for the dog's head.

Other water mills were built in the pioneer period, but they were not as

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numerous as might have been expected from Missouri's unparalleled water power. On the border between Arkansas and Missouri the Mammoth Spring was utilized for milling purposes. Beyond this the power possibilities of the never failing streams and springs of the Ozarks were ignored practically until the present generation.

Hydro-Electric Opportunities.

A. M. Haswell of Springfield, who is qualified as an expert in knowledge of the Ozarks, recently wrote:

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Centennial history of Missouri (the center state) one hundred years in the Union, 1820-1921, Volume I, Part 39

Author: Stevens, Walter Barlow, 1848-1939 Publication date: 1921 Publisher: St. Louis, Chicago, The S. J. Clarke publishing company Number of Pages: 1074

Author: Stevens, Walter Barlow, 1848-1939
Publication date: 1921
Publisher: St. Louis, Chicago, The S. J. Clarke publishing company
Number of Pages: 1074