Paducah’s history




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Ravenswood. Aug. 1. Mile 221, Ravenswood  I missed wring about Marietta.    Marietta was named for Marie Antoinette, who was still in general favor in 1788. It was a thank you for French help in the Revolution.   Marietta is rightly proud of its history as the first real town in Ohio, and a key player in the subsequent settlement of the region.    It never became a big city like Cincinnati, even though the grandeur of its public buildings anticipated a much greater population.    I’m not sure what all supports Marietta today, but Marietta College is a big part.    It was founded way back in 1835, and has 1200 students. It is regarded as one of the top    Midwest colleges.  In Marietta, like many towns along the river, the architecture is dazzling, paid for with prosperity in the past. Months ago I contacted Joe Tewksbury, coach of the Marietta High School Rowing Club.    We met at the boathouse, w...
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On The River

Today is the day!  I spent a couple of hours transferring stuff to the boat, wondering if it would all fit. Amazingly it did, and then the boat had more of a homey feeling.  Before this I was more of a guest. A fisherman named Conrad stopped, and we visited.  He advised caution on the river, but accepted that I was probably prepared.  He had grown upon the Allegheny, further north.  Like everyone I’ve met here, he had great affection for the rivers. Yesterday at a street corner, a bald wirey  guy yelled to me, “Hey, where are you taking my boat!”, no doubt a Pennsylvania compliment.  At the boat ramp I met a couple of fishermen at 10:00AM who stayed there till 8:00PM.  Mike and Orlando. Orlando drives a cab, and Mike works for the same company, driving a tow truck which retrieves taxicabs.  They get in lots of accidents.  Mike and Orlando confirmed a sense I have of western Pennsylvania, that it a place stuck in an earlier time....
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Distinctions

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As few days ago I saw what is referred to as a “sawyer”. I wanted definition of the other terms for water hazards.     This is from a Kentucky state site: “Steamboats had to be on particular watch for different types of river hazards. “Rafts” were accumulations of logs that lodged on sandbars. Snags in the river waters came in a couple of forms. One, called “planters,” were whole trees whose roots had become embedded in the river bottom and reinforced by silt. The tree tops, limbs, and branches devastated many craft. “Sawyers” were much like planters but bobbed in the river top down with the bottom of the tree and roots cutting the water’s surface similar to a sawmill blade.” More distinctions.    Flowing into the Ohio are many ”rivers”, like the Licking River the Muskingum or Kanawha; “creeks”, and then “runs”.    Dictionary lists do not define “run”, but they are common on the Ohio. Too small to be a creek. All of this inflow reminds me that...
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