The daily Gate City. [volume] (Keokuk, Iowa) 1855-1916, 1914-02-10
A RIVER COME 70 LEE.

bank at Quincy with railroad tracks
running through it! Huge electric
cranes picking freight off these cars
and swinging it on to big steel barges
at the dock! Tugs nosing about
ready to take the barges off to New
Orleans, to ships bound for the can
AL, to Australia, to South America. to
the western coast Of the United
states, to Cuba, to India! Why not?
Twelve tugs and sixty barges will
be put on the river by Minneapolis
company, says the Quincy Herald.
Why this sudden realization OF the
possibilities of the Mississippi? Be,
cause of the sure knowledge by fore
sighted men that the opening of the
Panama canal means unequal competi-
ton between the middle west and the
east, unless the middle west can get
the cheap freight rates of a waterway.
Manufacturers are at an immense dis
advantage in competing with any city
east of Rochester because of the fact
that their profits are eaten up by the
rail freight rates. Why not use the
river? Why not indeed? 1t comes to
us now as the great salvation Of the
valleys commerce, and where SO long
ago 1t made and broke Quincy's pros
perity it bids fair to remake it thous-
and fold.
The Mississippi river forms nat.
iural extension of the Panama route
ito the very heart of North America
and is natural outlet for the prod
Iucts OF the great Mississippi valley.
There are over 10000 miles of nav
igable water that can be reached from
4 Minneapolis by the use of the barges
mentioned
The Alabama and New Orleans
ITransp company is operating
fifteen Of these steel barges between
Central Alabama and New Orleans.
Each barge carries 1000 tons on a six
loot draft and maintains speed OF
nine miles per hour in the shallow
winding channel of the Black Warrior
river The Black Warrior Is a much
smaller river than the Mississippi at
Minneapolis. These barges were de.
signed and built for this particular
service under the direction of John H.
Bernhard of Holland This is believ.
ed to be the first application OF mod.
ern European methods to river trans
lportation in this country
II Tho aro prarated = oa.y
of S4S per day of twenty-four hours
This Includes fuel. interest, mainten
ance, depreciation and the wages oil
three men This is at the rate OF q
little less than three-eights OF mill
per ton mile or about one-eighth OF
the lowest rail rate.
This line has been in operation only
few months but long enough tc
demonstrate that modern steel barges
driven by gas engines can Operate
successfully ON shallow rivers and
carry freight cheaper and more ex
lpeditiously than the ordinary freight
train. 1t ordinarily takes a week OF
more to ship freight by rail from
Pensacola to New Orleans, but Barge
No. l" has carried 1000 barrels OF
rosin through in twenty nine hours,
The Monongahela river at Pitts.
burgh is smaller stream at low
stages than the upper Mississippi a.
low stages, but It has been so i'm
proved that 1t carries 100000 tons
. Of freight annuslly-mostly coal and
, steel products. Railroad rates alone
| rs banks FIRE now only half as higl
/ as corresponding rates along the al
; legheny river which Is unimproysd.
|, The. United States government has
/ adopted a proiect--and is spending
, many millions of dollars in carry.na
J IL out that will provide as good Z
J channel on the upper Mississippi NJ
, exists on the upper Rhine. and a bet
. ter channel than now exists on ;Ils
Missouri or on the upper Ohio. wlier.
millions of tons of freight are handled
In barges Annually The cities Of faf
. upper Mississippi must keep fait1 with
TIE genera government and wisel,
serve their own interests by yroYtd
ling suitable rsihjic terminals on (
great waterway that is being irnproy