The Mississippi Valley Traveler Podcast
The Mississippi River has cut a deep path through the heart of America for thousands of years, but how well do we really know the river beyond Huck Finn and headline-grabbing floods? In this podcast, Dean Klinkenberg wades into stories about the characters and places from the big river’s past and present.
Episodes
Of all the great archaeological sites around the world, I suspect the one near my hometown, Cahokia Mounds State Historic Site, is among the least appreciated. While the rich floodplain along the Mississippi River south of Alton, Illinois (known as the American Bottom) has a long history of human settlements, around the year 1050 a new community sprung up that would grow into the largest pre-Colombian settlement in ...
The lower half of the Mississippi grows to an immense scale that is hard to comprehend until you’re sitting on a small boat in the middle of it. In this season of the Mississippi Valley Traveler podcast, we’re going to go deeper into that world, of the lower Mississippi. We’re kicking off this new season with an episode where we dive into the ecology of the lower River. Long-time fisheries biologist Jack Killgore ta...
Coming soon! The Mississippi Valley Traveler Podcast resumes a new season on March 4. Listen for a quick preview of upcoming episodes.
Mary Ann Sternberg has spent twenty years challenging the idea that the River Road between Baton Rouge and New Orleans is nothing more than rows of noxious chemical plants interspersed with 19th century plantation houses, so in this episode, we dig into its past and present. Mary Ann begins by orienting us to the geography of the River Road and the region’s indigenous inhabitants. She describes the arrival of Europe...
In this episode, I talk with Jim Gass, Director of Research and Education at the Centre for French Colonial Life, about the long and rich history of Sainte Genevieve, Missouri. We begin with a discussion of what we know about the indigenous people who lived in the area before Europeans arrived, then talk about the French settlers who moved into the region in the 18th century. Jim describes their daily lives, the cro...
In this episode, I interview long-time river guide and Sage of the Lower Mississippi, John Ruskey. John has been guiding and living on the Mississippi for nearly 30 years, so I start by letting him describe the Lower Mississippi River that he knows. We talk about some of the river’s characteristics that make it a special place, including its vastness, its extreme variations from high water to low water, and the dive...
A hundred years ago, shantyboat communities could be found along many rivers in the US. Historian Gregg Andrews went in-depth to research these communities, inspired in part by the discovery of a personal connection to them, which resulted in a book called “Shantyboats and Roustabouts: The River Poor of St. Louis, 1875 to 1930.” In this episode, I talk with Gregg about those shantyboat communities. After Gregg descr...
You probably know a little bit about Hannibal, Missouri, because of the books written by a guy named Mark Twain, but I bet you don’t know much about the history of African Americans who’ve lived in Hannibal, even though Hannibal has had African American residents from its earliest days. I didn’t until I talked with Faye Dant, founder of a Hannibal museum called Jim’s Journey.
In this episode, Dant fills me in on the...
Our summer road trip down the Great River Road continues in this episode. We start just after Lake Pepin and make our way to the Mississippi’s confluence with the Ohio River at Cairo, Illinois. Along the way, I’ll comment on the following places: the Upper Mississippi River National Fish & Wildlife Refuge; Winona, Minnesota; in Wisconsin: Alma, Fountain City, La Crosse, and Prairie du Chien; Dubuque, Iowa, and G...
It’s summer and many of y’all will be hitting the road to travel and see something new (or revisit places you enjoy). I haven’t done a travel-themed podcast in a while, so in the next couple of episodes, I’m going to go over the highlights of driving the Great River Road. In this episode, I start with an overview of what to expect from the drive plus some overall highlights. Then, I start a north to south trek down ...
In this episode, we continue our detour along the Missouri River with part 2 of my conversation with Steve Schnarr from Missouri River Relief. In part two, Steve describes the process the Corps of Engineers used to channelize the river, how it changed the river, what we lost, and how some folks gained new land. He talks about a Missouri River bridge that was built over land, and about the hopes for commercial naviga...
In this episode, we detour off the main channel of the Mississippi River to get to know its longest tributary: the Missouri River. Our guide for this exploration is Steve Schnarr, Race Director for Missouri River Relief. We covered a lot of territory (like the Missouri River), so our conversation is split between two episodes. In this one, part one, we cover some of the basics of the river’s geography, including whe...
February 1 is National Baked Alaska Day. April 14 is National Ex-Spouse Day, but April 22 marks Earth Day. We’ve had these (and more!) national days celebrating things silly and crucial, but we’ve never had a National Mississippi River Day. Until this year. It’s long overdue. On June 2, we’ll celebrate the first National Mississippi River Day. In this episode, I talk with Michael Anderson, the Director of Outreach a...
In this episode, I have the pleasure of talking with accomplished chef and St. Louis area resident Josh Galliano. We talk about his path to becoming a chef and the family and cultural influences. He grew up in southern Louisiana near the Mississippi River, where he had regular access to fresh, seasonal products. Mostly, though, we talk about campfire cooking. Galliano prepares memorable meals on sandbars for a local...
In 1964, four members of the Ku Klux Klan killed two African American men in Mississippi. The story of their murder and the following decades of stops and starts in the prosecution of their killers inspired my latest Frank Dodge mystery: Murder on the Mississippi. In this episode, I give some background on the murder of Dee and Moore and how their murder influenced my latest book. Murder on the Mississippi takes pla...
Living out of an RV or van seems more possible than ever before, and, based on what’s out there on social media, a lot of people have already taken the plunge. If you’re someone who is curious about what it takes to make the switch to full-time RV life, this episode is for you. I talk with Patti Hunt, host of the RV Life podcast, and someone with plenty of first-hand experience. We focus mostly on her personal story...
In April 1965, the Upper Mississippi River surged to heights never before recorded, threatening to swallow entire towns whole. This episode plunges you into the chaos as the perfect storm—deep snowpack, torrential rain, and frozen ground—transformed America's greatest river into an unstoppable force.
Journey from the imperiled bridges of Minneapolis to the desperate fight for survival in Winona, where 1.3 millio...
In this week's episode, we uncover the surprising story of Iowa's pivotal role in African American civil rights. From the groundbreaking 1839 court case that made Iowa a free territory to the remarkable story of Charlotta Pyles—a formerly enslaved woman who raised $3,000 through East Coast speaking tours to free her family members—we explore how this Midwestern state led the nation in civil rights advances...
You may never have heard of Dallas City, Illinois, but to the folks who grew up there, Dallas City was idyllic. The town had a small but diverse business community. Crime was rare and mostly petty stuff. The local streams, creeks, and woods fed a child’s curiosity. And the biggest playground, the Mississippi, challenged and calmed young and old.
Jon Kukuk is one of those folks whose childhood was shaped by the rhyt...
What started out as one guy with a jon boat picking up trash along the Mississippi in his hometown has since evolved into one of the largest, best known, most inspirational organizations in the country. In this episode, Educational Facilitator Mike Coyne-Logan describes how Living Lands & Waters (LLW) grew from the hands and mind of Chad Pregracke to the purpose-driven organization it is today. We talk about LLW...
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