Overview

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. Brasseaux and Fontenot brace readers with a boldly revisionist picture of the opulent Mississippi River floating palaces: strippeddown, utilitarian freight-haulers belching smoke from twin stacks, churning through shallow swamps and narrow tributary streams, and encountering such hazards as shoals, sawyers, stumps, high-water 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. The first major study of a fascinating slice of the steamboat industry, this book showcases a trade critically important to New Orleans's prosperity but largely forgotten in southern historiography until now. It captures the period just before the iron horse emerged as America's undisputed master of inland conveyance.

Full Product Details

9780807129753

Table of Contents

Reviews

Author Information

A native of Acadiana, Carl A. Brasseaux is the author of more than thirty books on French North America. In June 2010, he retired as director of the Center for Louisiana Studies, director of the Center for Cultural and Eco-Tourism, director of the Press, professor of history, and managing editor of Louisiana History -- all at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. A lifelong resident of southern Louisiana, Keith P. Fontenot is an archivist for the Saint Landry Parish clerk of court's office and the coauthor of Creoles of Color in the Bayou Country. He lives in Opelousas.

Tab Content 6

Customer Reviews

Recent Reviews

Countries Available