The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1910-10-12
ABOUT FATHER OF WATERS
THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER is GER
TAINLY A QUEER ONE.
Over 1000 Miles Long 1t Passes
Through a Variety of Climates,
Up Hill to the Gulf.

Up Hill to the Gulf.
Less than 1000 miles is the long
est voyage possible from New York
to any European port via> one body
of water, the Atlantic ocean. But
an American may make longer voy-
age via one body of water and never
leave the interior of his own coun-
try. For the length of our great.
Mississippi river, including the Mis-
souri, river, which geographers now
consider really the main stream, is
1920 miles.
1t is a wasteful river; enough good
soil is elected annually from it's
mouth to make a great many farms.
If it were possible to collect and
compress this sediment it would
make a block $50 feet high and one
mile square at the base. Or, think
of it as being a quantity of rich silt
sufficient to plaster six inches deep
800 farms of 1000 acres each.
And water! Stand on the levee
bank at food time anywhere below
the mouth of the Ohio, and for every
pulse beat of our wrist there passes
before you 100000 cubic feet of
water; S40,0O0,O00 every minute.
Flows Up Hill.
Curiously enough this vast mass
of water flows up hill to the gulf.
For it has been found that the mouth
of the river is much further from
the center of the earth than is it's
source 1t is the so-called "centri-
fugal force" or inertia, produced by
the rotation of the earth that keeps
the stream moving toward the
equator. The water is acted upon
somewhat as it is when you rapidly
| swing pail of it about your head.
If the cid earth should stop rotating
/ the Mississippi would flow north; as
it is, inertia throws it southwark.
That is not the only curious effect
| for which the rotation of the earth
| is responsible. Another most queer
thing is that the right bank wears
| more than the left one, owing to a
westward inertia produced by the
| earth's motion eastward.
Anyone who has ever had TO lie
| in bed in one place for a long time
| knows how tiresome it gets and what
relief it is to make a change. Per-
haps this is why old Father of Wa
ters,'' as the Indians called it, shifts
! so restlessly; for it has been lying
| in its bed a long time. AS it lies
! there upon its back, with it's arms
| Outstretched across great states it
shifts and losses very uneasily.
| Sometimes it grows fretful from very
WEAKNESS, no doubt of lying in one
| place; and then it filings itself right
out of bed, for it's banks are low.
These wriggles are tremendously
relieving to the old stream. but they
| bring disaster and dismay to farm
| ers ensconced near by. They feel
deeply aggrieved, not to say annoyed,
when the old father squirms out of
bed. They would like him to lie
! quietly. For this reason the banks,
or sides Of the bed, have been raised
by "levees, - just as the sides of your
bed were built up high when you
were very little and prone to toss
about.
Cut-Offs Curious Results.
The tendency of the stream to
make "cut-offs' across it's multitu-
dinous crooked tangle of bends is
productive of curious results. For
many Of these necks are long and
narrow, 10 or 20 miles around and
only two or three miles across. At
time of flood the river has a ten
dency to take the shortest cut. 1t
often rushes across these narrow
necks, establishing new and shorter
/ channels.
! Then a town which was a river
{ town" when the sun set will find it.
self at sunrise far in the country,
miles away from the river. Some
times a planter goes to sleep upon
his farm in one state and wakes to
ind himself in another state and
his farm transferred to the domain
of another.
The world has no other stream
that traverses such a variety of eli
mates as the Mississippi. One may
leave its upper reaches near St.
Cloud, Mimi, when they are fast
bound in ice and snow, and, travel
ing by train to Louisiana, stand on
its banks again, two days later, and
watch its waves lap lazily against
grassy levees in the warm sunshine
4 -levees that lead through green
forests of magnolia and liveoak,
scented gardens and orange groves,
The area drained by the Father of
Waters is over 1,245 900 square
miles. Or, think of it another way;