Steamboats on Louisiana's Bayous : a history and directory / Carl A. Brasseaux and Keith P. Fontenot.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Brasseaux, Carl A.

Contributor:

Fontenot, Keith P.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Inland navigation--Louisiana--History.

Inland navigation.

Steamboats--Louisiana--History.

Steamboats.

History.

Louisiana.

Physical Description:

xi, 277 pages, 12 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

Baton Rouge : Louisiana State University Press, [2004]

Summary:

In an extraordinary feat of research and intrepid historical navigation, Carl A. Brasseaux and Keith P. Fontenot serve as guides through the labyrinthian and often harrowing world of Louisiana bayou steamboat journeys of the mid to late nineteenth century. The bayou country's steamboat saga mirrors in microcosm the tale of America's most colorful -- and most highly romanticized -- transportation era. But Brasseaux and Fontenot brace readers with a boldly revisionist picture of the opulent Mississippi River floating palaces: stripped-down, utilitarian freight-haulers belching smoke from twin stacks, churning through shallow swamps and narrow tributary streams, and encountering such hazards as shoals, sawyers, stumps, highwater and dry-bed seasons, and the remains of vessels claimed by those treacheries. For decades, steamboats transported goods, passengers, and mail between New Orleans and south Louisiana's vibrant interior agricultural region, bearing testimony to the resourcefulness, ingenuity, and tenacity of crews in conquering the challenges posed by a forbidding environment. Brasseaux and Fontenot marshaled a monumental array of information, including sources long-buried in courthouses, private collections, and the records of the Army Corps of Engineers. They offer data on some five hundred steamboats, keelboats, and barges known to have operated in the bayou country. This book is the first major study of a fascinating slice of the steamboat industry, showcasing a trade critically important to New Orleans's prosperity but largely forgotten in southern historiography until now. Encompassing economic, social, transportation, and environmental history, it captures the period just before the iron horse emerged as America's undisputed master of inland conveyance.

Contents:

A transportation revolution comes to Louisiana

Challenges to steamboat navigation in the Bayou country

Origins of steam navigation in the Bayou country

Civil War

Postbellum recovery and a protracted decline.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 263-269) and index.

ISBN:

0807129755

OCLC:

54407437