TL;DR -- We saw a graphic while browsing that was not attributed. So, we went looking and found something similar. It shows the comparative flow of the major rivers. The Ohio River stands out as does the Mississippi River which it feeds. Rivers in the southwest are drier by nature. But. they have lots of people drawing off of them.
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Rivers are a favorite subject. We enjoy them many ways. Some are famous. Others seem to have disappeared. And example is the Arkansas River that comes out of the Rockies of CO and crosses several US States before joining the Mississippi in AR. Along the way though, if one searches for the river it seems to have disappeared. But, the flow went underground and reemerges sufficiently to support barge traffic from Tulsa, OK to New Orleans, LA.
On the other hand, the might Colorado River comes out of another part of the Rockies in CO and heads down to the Gulf of California. But, along the way, it is dammed (for Lakes) and tapped for people and crops. By the time it gets to Mexico, it is a small portion of itself.
Those are two western examples. Looking east, the Mississippi gets a large flow from the Ohio River after it has joined with the Missouri River near St. Louis, MO. Lewis & Clark was on both. They took the Ohio down to the Mississippi, then ventured north to travel up the Missouri River, to its source. In doing so, they also looked at some of the rivers of the northwestern part of the US.
What motivated this post was seeing a graphic and looking to see its source. We show the graphic below. At the same time, we looked at some of our earlier posts as they presented graphics too. Let's list a few of these and then add in a new graphic. Each post has a graphic with respect to US rivers.
- Continental divides (Feb 2025) -- we think of the Divide that we cross as we travel east-west in the western part of the U.S. But, there are other divides.
- New Missouri (Aug 2022) -- when one compares the upper Mississippi to the Missouri, the question about naming comes up. This was really the Missouri River which contributes more water from a longer route. Whereas the flow from the north is shorter and looks larger.
- East meets West (Jun 2022) -- the Gardner River flooded and got our interest. It flows through what is known as Gardiner, MT. The map shows all of the watershed of the continental U.S.
- Research notes: Rivers (Feb 2021) -- looks at some western rivers (Yellowstone, Gardner, ...) in an area where water goes either east or west.
- Rivers and more (Feb 2021) -- looks at the Mississippi and one link from the west to the east via the Fox River.
- How great? (Feb 2023) -- looks at a couple of elevation maps of the U.S. This is to put the below material into perspective.
We started really looking at rivers during the time of the pandemic. We were doing a lot of research which involved families who came west after the time of the U.S. start. This relates to the 250th anniversary of the birth of the Nation. Then, as we researched, more and more information became pertinent. This work precipitated our use of Frontier century and Lost generation.
First, let's put up the graphic which shows the comparative flow of watersheds that reach a certain rate of flow. Some of these show up with a light color since the flow is reduced severely as the water makes its way out of the mountains to the shore.
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| American rivers Pacific Institute |
In the middle, one sees the long reach of New England with the Ohio coming down to the Mississippi. So, stepping back, one can see the importance of the use of the Ohio in movement to the west. Wagons were brought west, moved north on the Mississippi, and then went up the Missouri. At that point, the wagons went west by land with rivers to cross. That shows rivers in two roles: means of motion; barrier to progress. We looked at the second one in our look at the New England party that left Boston and journeyed to Lawrence KS for two reasons: define a State; start a University.
Remarks: Modified: 08/15/2025
08/15/2025 -
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