Golden Thread Historic Boonville, Missouri

The river is much less wide, but much deeper than it was prior to CoE channeling. One can gain an understanding of the difference by viewing any of the oxbow lakes that remain in the valley. Big Lake up in Holt Co. is a good example of what the river channel used to look like.

The bottom of the current channel is believed to be constantly changing in depth due to the strength of the current. At St. Joe local fisherman say the bottom is generally at least 30 feet deep at normal flow levels. The strength of the current is augmented by the large amount of sediment carried in semi-diluted form. Up close, the river water looks lick chocolate milk.
 
The river is much less wide, but much deeper than it was prior to CoE channeling. One can gain an understanding of the difference by viewing any of the oxbow lakes that remain in the valley. Big Lake up in Holt Co. is a good example of what the river channel used to look like.

The bottom of the current channel is believed to be constantly changing in depth due to the strength of the current. At St. Joe local fisherman say the bottom is generally at least 30 feet deep at normal flow levels. The strength of the current is augmented by the large amount of sediment carried in semi-diluted form. Up close, the river water looks lick chocolate milk.

I remember reading in a book about the life of Nathan Boone, and how he led a company of government troops from Franklin up to Sibley, where they were going to build a government "factory" to trade with the Osage Indians. They crossed the Mo. River at Arrow Rock by riding their horses across, the river at that time was that shallow at that spot.
Now, the lower river has been engineered so it will self-maintain a minimum depth of at least 6 feet so as to permit barge traffic, but I can't imagine that it could ever get that low.
 
Yes, it's good to realize that the Missouri Rive was once multi-channeled and wider than it is today. Parts of it were probably shallower. Its main channel (which varied from year to year) was as swift as it is now. It is one of the most swift large rivers on the planet. Fords did exist, but they were known and easily guarded by Federals. The Federals themselves usually chose to cross the river on steamboats. Rebels trying to get across usually used skiffs and swam their horses behind them. Occasionally, they could commandeer a steamboat. It was a formidable obstacle and continues to be one today. For that matter, the Osage was a formidable obstacle, too, except in western Missouri. There, it was merely an obstacle--no more formidable than a lot of other rivers.
 
Have you all seen the photo of two women on a cool wooden bridge wrapped with vines in front of the boonville reformatory?

No, I haven't. If you have it, show us, please.

And the Mo. River at Boonville is running bluff to bluff now. The river topped a levee about 5 miles north of Boonville on the northern bank and so the river bottoms are under about 5 feet of water all the way down to Rocheport. It's kind of interesting as the river is running a rich a rich brown color, almost like chocolate, while the water in the bottoms are almost a blue color, like one would find in a lake. Around the edge of the "lake," there are thousands and thousands of little toad or frogs with the occasional snake. It's kind of biblical.
 
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I seen it book Missouri crossroads of America, couldn't find it online its credited to state hist soc

The Mississippi river levees north of me failed a couple days ago
 
Used to live in Columbia, across the river. I remember crossing the river during the flood of 1993 and going across the bottomland with sandbags piled on each side of I-70. The water was as high as my car windows, nearly to the top of the sandbags. Nerve wracking.

For what it's worth, Sarah Evans, the country singer is from Boonville as was the ACW author, Phil Gottschalk.
 
Have you all seen the photo of two women on a cool wooden bridge wrapped with vines in front of the boonville reformatory?
I'd like to see this, too. I am aware of a small bridge that went out to a small island in the Training School (reformatory) Lake. Neither the lake nor the bridge are there any more. I am also aware of a picturesque bridge which used to span a cove on the Kemper Military School pond. That pond and bridge are gone, too. The bridge went away years before the pond was drained. Photos of that bridge are available online in the Maximillian Schmidt collection at the State Historical Society of Missouri. It seems likely that the Kemper bridge is the one you saw, but it might have been mislabeled.

Coming back to edit: I just spent more than an hour poring over Kemper pictures online, and could not find a clear picture of the old bridge on that pond (although I have seen pictures.)

@Boonslick, can you help us out with a Kemper bridge picture?
 
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Yes, Sir- Lt. Colonel!

Kemper Military Academy Aerial View (Color).jpg


Kemper Lake.jpg


Kemper Lake -4.jpg
 
I had a hunch you could help us out. Thanks! Kemper was a great institution back when these images were made. Professor Kemper, who founded this school, was the brother of General James Kemper.

Second-to-last picture titled "Red Bridge" might show a peek of my house through the trees. I never heard anyone refer to it as the "annex", but who knows?

@archieclement, does the Kemper bridge look like the one you saw?
 
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Its not Kemper then, the photo is labeled "Two women take a stroll around the grounds of Boonville reform school, circa 1900, dominated by the superintendents house on the hill behind them, photo by Dr Chas Swap

The bridge is closer to the building then kempers could be, its on the edge of the grounds down the hill. The house is also two story not three like Kempers
 
Its not Kemper then, the photo is labeled "Two women take a stroll around the grounds of Boonville reform school, circa 1900, dominated by the superintendents house on the hill behind them, photo by Dr Chas Swap

The bridge is closer to the building then kempers could be, its on the edge of the grounds down the hill. The house is also two story not three like Kempers

Scan it and submit.
 
Scan it and submit.
Okay, I know where it had to be, but I have never previously seen the photo. This is really great! I'll see if I can shoot a current picture of the view. The hollows and spring creeks below the house are currently full of flood water backed up from the Missouri River. The landscape has been altered,too. This could take a few days. Our buddy, @Booner, lives across the street from this site. He can help us figure out the location.
 
The book had three photos on two pages of boonville, the other two were of a houseboat "Nadine" and two prisoners in the boonville calabose making big rocks into small rocks, quite a pile they had done of small ones..........but I thought the bridge looked cool, mabye Booner can recreate it :D
 
Once again, @Boonslick comes through for us! @Booner and I went out there after lunch today and discovered that our hunch was accurate: The landscape has been dramatically altered. The little ravine is filled in and now one of the old entrance drives lies along a terrace that is actually higher than the lawn next to the house. Immediately to the east is another, higher terrace which used to have tennis courts. Some of this is behind fencing and razor wire now, but when I was a kid the place was unfenced. We could locate the spot because of the chimney alignment on the house and because of a two story bay sticking out on the northeast corner--barely visible behind the head of the lady on the right. We are pretty sure this was in the vicinity of the old tennis court. It is nearly impossible to shoot the same angle on the house now. Lots of huge shade trees obscure the view and we actually look down on the house from that spot now.

Garage is obviously newer. Original point of view was from out of frame on left.

supers house.jpg
 
When I first looked at the Rustic Bridge picture that Archie submitted, I thought it was taken from the Northeast corner of the Superintendent's house, but when I then looked at the pictures that Boonslick submitted, I now think the rustic bridge crossed over Ream's Branch, a steam that flows south to north on the west side of 10th street and forms the western boundary of the superintendents' property.

I'll take some pictures later on when it's not so dad burned hot outside.

BTW, I just finished putting some gutters on my garage so now the rains will stop, and the weather will probably turn into a drought
 
I can't get enough enlargement on @Boonslick's scans to see anything defining. They quickly go to pixels. If the bridge does span the spring creek, the shape of the house has been altered (and that's possible.)
 
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