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Travel/Study

Travel on the Mississippi

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Delta Queens’s iconic paddlewheel
Photo Credit for all: Joel Simon, ’74, MS ’84

Between the Civil War and the turn of the century, steamboats dominated traffic on the Mississippi, transporting passengers, cotton, and staple goods, blowing their shrill steam whistles as they approached the towns along the river. Every boat’s whistle was distinctive, wrote Joan Gandy and Thomas Gandy in The Mississippi Steamboat Era; boys in the towns along the river knew the boats by their whistles from miles away.

In 1979, seeking a domestic destination for the nascent alumni Travel/Study program, then-director Peter Voll chartered the historic paddle-wheeled steamboat the Delta Queen, filling it with 186 travelers for a two-week trip down the Mississippi.

The Delta Queen had been fully refurbished to evoke the golden era of steamboat travel, with a grand staircase, gleaming wood paneling and crystal chandeliers. The antique steam-powered calliope on the top deck had its own storied history and was rumored to have enjoyed a previous life at a circus. Boats dominated traffic on the Mississippi, transporting passengers, cotton, and staple goods, blowing their shrill steam whistles as they approached the towns along the river. Every boat’s whistle was distinctive, wrote Joan Gandy and Thomas Gandy in The Mississippi Steamboat Era; boys in the towns along the river knew the boats by their whistles from miles away.

Delta Queen docked in St. Paul, MN

Rixford Snyder described the trip from New Orleans to St. Louis in an interview with the Stanford Oral History Project later that year. “It was tremendous. We had the entire ship and it was fully packed. It turned out to be less of a history of the river and the South, although that was included, but more a study of the river itself in terms of flooding and the tremendous strength and power that river has.”

Passing through Arkansas while the river was at flood stage and still rising, travelers could see nothing but water for miles. In Cairo, Illinois, water surrounded the city up to 12-feet high, held at bay by walls.

When they weren’t in thrall to the power of the great river, guests were immersed in jazz, Dixieland, and Memphis blues. One of the steamboat’s staff, an accomplished musician, gave a series of lectures on the music of the region. Rixford Snyder told the Stanford Oral History Project, “He began with New Orleans jazz, then Memphis jazz, and ended up with St. Louis and there were four different lectures he gave on the development of jazz, sitting at the piano. He plays eight instruments beautifully. He had his own orchestra on board which included his mother, who was about a 78 year old woman who played the bass.” The Delta Queen trip became one of the program’s most frequently repeated trips. Learning opportunities in the region being as deep and wide as the Big Muddy, itineraries and lecture themes changed each year. The trip developed a loyal following among alumni, with many travelers repeating the trip every spring.

Travelers on 1986 Delta Queen College

The Delta Queen was decommissioned in 2008 and turned into a floating hotel. Travel/Study recently chartered an all-new sternwheeler, the Queen of the Mississippi, to reprise the popular riverboat cruise. Environmental engineering professor David Freyberg, MS ’77, PhD ’81, who will lead an upcoming trip from Memphis to New Orleans, is fascinated by rivers, both as natural systems and for the role they play in the cultural, economic and political history of a region. He says there is no river more fascinating than the Mississippi.

Plying the Mighty Mississippi

“It literally knits together the North American continent between the Rocky Mountains and the Appalachians,” he says. “It is big, it is powerful, it is vital to our economy, and it shapes a vast landscape in both space and time. Most of all, it needs to be experienced firsthand.”