How we turned one of our country’s biggest rivers into a machine - and what happens when that machine starts to break down.
For more than two hundred years Americans have tried to tame the Mississippi River. And, for that entire time, the river has fought back.
Journalist and author Boyce Upholt has spent dozens of nights camping along the Lower Mississippi and knows the river for what it is: both a water-moving machine and a supremely wild place. His recent book, “The Great River: The Making and Unmaking of the Mississippi River” tells the story of how engineers have made the Mississippi into one of the most engineered waterways in the world, and in turn have transformed it into a bit of a cyborg — half mechanical, half natural.
In this episode, host Nate Hegyi and Upholt take us from the flood ravaged town of Greenville, Mississippi, to the small office of a group of army engineers, in a tale of faulty science, big egos and a river that will ultimately do what it wants.
Featuring Boyce Upholt
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LINKS
You can find Boyce’s new book The Great River, at your local bookstore or online.
The 2018 study which attributed increased engineering of the Mississippi as a greater influence to worsening floods on the river than climate change.
In 1944 geologist Harold Fisk completed a years-long report on the natural course of the Lower Mississippi. Rather than presenting the river as a static (and straight) waterway, his now famous maps showed a meandering and ever-changing watershed.
The Mississippi Department of Archives & History has a remarkable collection of digitized photos from the 1927 flood, including depictions of the refugee encampments where Southern officials forced many Black locals to remain as guarantee of a future Southern workforce.
To get a sense of the type of work being done on the Mississippi in modern day, a US Army Corps of Engineers video detailing concrete revetment on the Lower Mississippi.
The Army Corps of Engineers produced the first Project Design Flood in 1928. This was a calculation of the worst possible floods that could happen on the Mississippi, and provided a starting point from which to build new systems of protection. Check out the 1956 Project Design Flood here, still used by engineers today.
Curious about recent controversy on the Mississippi? In 2023, Louisiana broke ground on the Mid-Barataria Sediment Diversion – a $3 billion coastal restoration project that will divert portions of the Mississippi’s flow in hopes of rebuilding lost land via sediment deposition. The project has been hugely controversial and state officials issued a stop-work order in February. As reported by the New Orleans Advocate, work just resumed this summer, although tensions remain high.
CREDITS
Our host is Nate Hegyi.
Written and mixed by Marina Henke.
Editing by Taylor Quimby and Nate Hegyi.
Our staff also includes Felix Poon and Justine Paradis.
Our executive producer is Taylor Quimby. Rebecca Lavoie is NHPR’s Director of On-Demand Audio.
Music in this episode from Blue Dot Sessions, Martin Landstrom, and Chris Zabriskie. Our theme music is by Breakmaster Cylinder.
Outside/In is a production of New Hampshire Public Radio
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