It’s great to come across articles like this that give credit to the steamboat crews. More importantly, it points out something we don’t often consider. That steamboats and showboats were not just a southern thing. Steamboats and showboats were a river-thing, and a lot of the traffic moving down through the south along the Ohio River originated in Pittsburgh.
Western Pennsylvania and the banks of the Monongahela, Allegheny, and Ohio Rivers were the launching points for many early immigrant settlers traveling west. The river traffic grew and evolved over time as dams and locks allowed for more ease in transportation. We forget that Pittsburgh and New Orleans were sister cities in commerce, and they remain so today. Coal, steel, whiskey, and all manner of commercial goods made their way from Pittsburgh, down the Ohio, past Maysville and Louisville, to where the Ohio meets the Mississippi River at Cairo, Illinois. From there, goods and passengers continued downriver through Memphis and Baton Rouge and finally arriving in New Orleans. Travel was limited by the water’s conditions and the changing of the seasons, but the riverboats were always home to lots of whiskey in one way or another. It’s good to be reminded that even the showboats began in the east…and moved south.
