History of Early Steamboat Navigation on the Missouri River

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. This event led to a material change in the plan of the work, and it was decided to make it, not merely a narrative of personal experiences, but a history of steamboat navigation on the Missouri River. Very few people now have any conception of the part which this remarkable business played in the upbuilding of. The West. There is no railroad system in the United States to-day whose importance to its tributary coun try is relatively greater than was that of the Missouri River to the trans-mississippi territory in the first seventy-five years of the nineteenth century. The busi ness of the fur trade, the intercourse of government agents with the Indians, the campaigns of the army throughout the valley, and the wild rush of gold seekers to the mountains, all depended, in greater or less degree, upon the Missouri River as a line of transportation.