This blog post was updated on August 13, 2021.
This Saturday will mark two hundred years since the first steamboat navigated the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, arriving in New Orleans four months after leaving Pennsylvania.
The iconic journey established New Orleans as a busy port town, opening up entire sections of the country along the wide rivers to trade, growth and expansion.
To mark the anniversary, an exhibit called ‘New Orleans Bound 1812: The Steamboat that Changed America’ will be going on at the Cabildo Museum in the French Quarter.
In the two centuries since the first journey, cities like St. Louis, Cincinnati and Memphis became established centers of commerce, and saw tremendous growth in population.
To celebrate, New Orleans will hold a “re-enactment of the steamboat’s arrival in the French Quarter, a symposium on steamboats and other events to mark the anniversary.”
And for those wanting to experience what these luxury, steamboats were once like, the American Queen – “a cruising steamboat that once operated out of New Orleans” – will be announcing the reestablishment of its services, being the only steamboat offering overnight accommodations.
Source: Yahoo News
Flickr Photo Credit: TAZphotos
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