The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-06-09
PRESIDENT AND
 FATHER IF WATERS Roosevelt Will Make Voyage
 Down Mississippi SOME BOATS OF OLD DAYS Many Interesting Things That He Will Have Opportunity to See Along
 the Way--lnterested in
 Waterways.
SOME BOATS OF OLD DAYS

Washington, June s.-(Speciai.} .}-Recog- hilton of the value to this country of the water route afforded by the Father Of Waters" Is likely to be more general than ever before, after next October l Over the long aqueous highway where once thousands of passengers each month made the journey by boat from St. Louis 1 or Cincinnati to New Orleans, the Pres | ident of the United States has prom i ised' unless some unforeseen exigeney prevents, to make a tour of inspection next autumn. Mr. Roosevelt Is anxious, 1t is well known to see both what has l been done on the greatest of American rivers and what larger projects remain 1 to be completed in order that the revival of the routes of inland water transporta- tion, for which the chief executive has pleaded eloquently, may take place The needs of the Mississippi are. of course. typical of the needs of lesser rivers It 1t significant that governors of sixteen | states have united in urging President Roosevelt to make this trip He has ac- cepted their invitation and coupled with 1t statement of belief that the im- provement of conditions of traffic on our waterways Is of vital concern to every community of this country.
 National Highways.
 All apart from future requirements of the natural highways of Uncle Sam's dominion, the voyage, whether up or down the long winding stream, will be of kind to appeal to the imagination of man of President Roosevelt's tenn perament Whatever Is left on the river from the activities of ante-bellum days l still possesses the picturesque human in- terest which delights a President of gen. erous impulses and liking for men of the adventurous pioneer type. The fleet of river steamers, to be sure, Is smaller now than 1t was in the halcyon days of the traffic. The advent of puffing tug boats capable of pulling a bevy of heavy barges for a thousand miles or more in reasonably quick time has caused the gradual disappearance of most of the many-decked steamers Into whose holds three thousand tons or more of cargo could be slowed.
 As author of the "Winning of the West" and the Life of Thomas Hart Benton," President Roosevelt is certain to be particularly interested in the rem inlscenses of pioneer days along the river In the grass grown towns which once aspired to be metropolises and in those places which like Memphis and Vicks- burg are really achieving something of the greatness that was early predicted. Start From St. Louis.
 Ane President may perhaps start from St. Louis, which from a small French trading post. has become one of the larg- est cities of the western hemisphere It's destiny was cut out for it long before the days of railroad building, for the early settlers discovered in it a center from which trade was possible over more than ten thousand miles of navi- gable river. Some of the stretches of uninterrupted course on which St. Louis has prided itself ever since the era when canoes and rafts furnished the only transportation facilities of the interior of the country were 5000 miles up the Missouri as far as Fort Benton, 800 miles on the Mississippi to Minneapolis, 1900 miles down stream to New Orleans, 1000 miles up the river to Pittsburg 300 miles on the Tennessee to Florence 25O miles on the Cumberland to Nashville, FOO miles up the Arkansas to Fort Gibson, GOO miles on the White river to Bull river, 600 miles on the Ouachita to Camden, and TOO miles on the Red river into the interior of Texas. The total of navigable waters in the Mississippi and its tributaries un- der the present plan of improvement
 
 Immense Commerce.
 Of the immense commerce before the civil war along the deepest and most | valuable stretch, that between St Louis | and New Orleans, Mark Twain has writ ten a quaintly picturesque and sympa- thetic account, such a one as might be | expected from a man who In childhood 1 had as a practical ideal of future great | ness the possibility of becoming a steam | boat pilot. For the boys in the Mis- | souri river town in which MT. Clemens was brought up all entertained a vague | hope that If God was good to them they might become pirates, but next to that they wanted to become boatmen. The | sight of the passing traffic was of a | character to fire the imagination Some ! idea of the extent of 1t is gained from 1 the statement that the marine insurance written in the city of St. Louis about the time Mark Twain was looking longingly upon the river craft-specifically, In 1S42- | amounted to nearly sS0.000000.
 l The story of the decline of commerce | on the Mississippi to position in which. | though still considerable, 1t has for many | years been distinctly subordinate to the | railroad interests of the Mississippi Val ley has been graphically and amusingly told by Mark Twain himself in chapters with which President Roosevelt is of 
 that other factors besides the natural competition between two types of trans portation entered into the decline. Thus the civil war witnessed the destruction of many of many famous old boats that had made their mark by nearly equaling the racing record from New Orleans to Cairo-three days fiat. It was an easy matter, In the latter days of the Con federacy, wien northern boat steamed between southern shores, to mount a bat tery of few guns on one of the bluffs anu sink her as she tride to pass: so that even after, in President incoln's classic phrase, "the Father of Waters flowed untroubled to the sea- a good many mischances befell members of the river fleet.
 Historical Evidence.
 Interesting historical evidences on the Mississippi itself of work already done to improve this great natural highway of commerce Mir. Roosevelt will find everywhere. From an early date labor and money have been spent in relieving the channel of the snags, so easily formed in a stream that Is perpetually