Omaha daily bee., 1910-02-05
PIERRE AFTER BOAT SERVICE
State Meeting to Discuss Navigation
to Be Held in Dakotas.
POWER POSSIBILITIES OF STREAM
Effort VIII BE Made to Have River
Surveyed by Government to
Determine sites for
Canals.

PIERRE, s.. D., Feb. 4-(Special)-The
Missouri river, it's possibilities, and de-
velopment, was up for discussion again
last evening and today in this city, In
the meetings Of the Board of Trade the
Business Mems meetings. At the Board
of Trade meeting last evening. commit
tees which had been appointed at a pre-
vious meeting for the working up of a
waterways meeting here for South Da-
kota; and for the promotion of a boat
ing service reported progress.
G. r. DeLand, who had been in corre-
~spondence with a number of the leaders
of the Deep Waterways movement in the
country, announced that he had secured a
tentative promise from Governor Burke,
Of North Dakota, that he would be present
at a meeting to discuss deep Waterways;
that representatives of the Missouri River
organizations at both St Louis and Kan
sas City, had requested ample notice of
such a meeting that they might be present;
and Mr.. DeLand asked the appointment of
committees TO assist in the work of pro-
motion of the meeting. Messrs. E. c. Kind
ley, L. H.. Glow and A. G. Brink, were
selected as a committee on publicity and
promotion; and Messrs. j. Dalton, V. Pet
efson, and F. A. Twiss a committee on
finance. These committees at a later
meeting decided upon Wednesday and
Thursday, March 80 and 81, as dates for
the waterways meeting, and the business
men OF the state will be invited to attend
and participate in such meeting.
P. F.. Mcclure. who was at the head Of
the committee to investigate the PROPOSE
ton Of boat building and actual business
along the river in that direction, reported
that the committee had been busy up to
the present collecting information as to
what was the best type of boat to build
and the power to be used in its operation,
in which they had been in correspondence
with boatmen who had in the past, and
who are at the present, operating on the
stream. They nav also been looking into
the matter of traffic which could be ex-
pected, and that the proposition Of handling
coal from up-river points appears to be
one which is receiving a great deal of at
tention at the present time. The trouble
so far in the handling of up-river lignites
is that they will not stand exposure to the
air without Stacking, and the committee
has discovered that there has been a great
deal of experimenting along the line OF
briquetting this coal to assure its being
made a merchantable commodity and one
which can be shipped without the loss
which attends attempts to handle 1t as 1t
comes from the mine.
Missouri as Power Possibility.
At the meeting Of the Business Mems
club at noon today another phase of the
Missouri river was taken up when Doane
Robinson called attention to the power
possibilities Of the stream in the vicinity
OF this city. He showed that at Little
Bend a few miles up stream from this
city there is a fall Of fifteen feet six
inches, where the river make a circuit OF
about twenty miles and bends back to a
point $500 feet across the neck" AT
Big Bend, about the same distance down
stream, Is a similar bend with with a
swing Of nearly thirty miles, doubling back
to within 5000 feet, with a fall of twenty
one feet six inches. These two points By
cuts across the narrow necks would de-
velop approximately 25.OO0 horse power. or
this the upper point would develop 10000,
and the lower one-tifteen thousand horse
power. With those put to work, there
would be a power development in this
part OF the state. which would of itself
bring about a great material growth. To
get something started In the way Of de-
velopment Of this power, a committee was
named to communicate with the South
Dakota delegation IN congress to secure, IL
possible, a government survey of the two
points, and a plan for their development.