Working the Mississippi: Two Centuries of Life on the River by Bonnie Stepenoff
The Mississippi River occupies a sacred place in American culture and mythology. Often called The Father of Rivers, it winds through American life in equal measure as a symbol and as a topographic feature. To the people who know it best, the river is life and a livelihood. River boatmen working the wide Mississippi are never far from land. Even in the dark, they can smell plants and animals and hear people on the banks and wharves.
Bonnie Stepenoff takes readers on a cruise through history, showing how workers from St. Louis to Memphis changed the river and were in turn changed by it. Each chapter of this fast-moving narrative focuses on representative workers: captains and pilots, gamblers and musicians, cooks and craftsmen. Readers will find workers who are themselves part of the country’s mythology from Mark Twain and anti-slavery crusader William Wells Brown to musicians Fate Marable and Louis Armstrong.
About the Author
Bonnie Stepenoff lives on the banks of the Mississippi River in Cape Giradeau, Missouri. In 2012, for her extensive writing and preservation efforts, she was awarded the Rozier Award for Lifetime Achievement by the Missouri Alliance for Historic Preservation (Missouri Preservation). Stepenoff is Professor Emerita of history at Southeast Missouri State University. Three of her five books were published by the University of Missouri Press.
Product Specifications
Published by University of Missouri, 2015. Hardback, 208 pages.
