THE MISSISSIPPI RIVER PROBLEM 13 



THE MISSISSIPPI RIVEE PROBLEM 



by WALTER SHELDON TOWER, Ph.D. 



UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA 



THE project for a deep waterway from the Great Lakes to the Gulf 

 has been dreamed about and discussed intermittently for half a 

 century, but nothing definite ever came of it until a little over a year 

 ago, when, from a conference held at St. Louis, there was born the 

 permanent organization called the " Lakes to the Gulf Deep Waterways 

 Association." That this concerted movement came at the psychological 

 moment has been indicated by subsequent events. Last winter the 

 Rivers and Harbors Congress in session at Washington supported the 

 project. The president in his Memphis address heartily endorsed the 

 enterprise; shortly afterward his annual message called attention to 

 the need for river improvement and the question is now in the hands 

 of congress with some definite action sure to come in the near future. 



Within the last decade, this country has entered three fields of gov- 

 ernment activity, forest conservation, reclamation of arid and swamp 

 lands and the building of the Isthmian Canal, the far-reaching results 

 of which can scarcely be estimated at this time. The development of 

 a ship channel through the Mississippi Valley, with feeding lines in the 

 larger tributaries, would likewise be of such tremendous importance to 

 the economic progress of the country that it must be ranked second to 

 none in the list of great national policies. 



A few simple statements of fact furnish striking evidence of the 

 need for such a waterway. The drainage basin of the Mississippi sys- 

 tem covers an area of approximately a million and a quarter square 

 miles, or rather more than two fifths of the United States proper. This 

 two fifths of the country is the real heart and soul of the nation's pros- 

 perity. With its development the United States has not only become 

 independent of the rest of the world, but also has risen with tremendous 

 strides to stand as the greatest producer of food-stuffs that the world 

 ever has seen or ever will see. More than half the total population of 

 the country to-day is found in the score of states bordering directly on 

 the navigable portions of the Mississippi system. As the population 

 increases the most rapid growth must be in these same states, until 

 a century hence with hundreds of millions of people living between the 

 slopes of the Alleghenies and the Rockies, there will exist in the Missis- 

 sippi Valley the highest and most permanent type of civilization in 

 the history of man. Three fourths of the world's cotton crop is raised 



