American rivers, flow

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 mighty 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. 
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  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. 

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 - 

New Englanders and Leary

TL;DR -- We saw a genealogy chart which included shields and looked further. That reminded us that we have had several posts on the subject. Heritage is an important subject, even for relationships in fields of expertise such as mathematics, technology, and psychology. 

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We were looking at an old pedigree chart that was hand drawn. Wonderful work. My thought was, at least, we know this didn't come from GenAI/LLM. Here is a compressed look at the photo of the chart that was posted by Melissa Berry on the FB Group - New England Family Genealogy and History.  

Posted on FB by
Melissa Berry

One sees modern verrsions of this type of chart, many done by computers. Our hope is that these get documented some way for future researchers, especially if provenance needs to be considered. But, that's another issue for another time. 

We have had several posts on genealogy and on our thoughts of such. To note, we support The Heritage Society  Community and the Daughters of the American Revolution and more. With the 250th now in progress, themes of lineage will be constant. 

But, with tecnology, especially advanced computing, we have been going on about this for several years now. In particular, we note the need for computers to support science and any work of difficulty and as those that are complicated. Along that line, we looked at Gibbs of thermodynamics fame after the Nobel prize of last year being directed to mathematical physics (namely, xNN). HIs work impressed Maxwell of Scotland (as in, James Clerk). 

Some posts on genealogy: Endless genealogies; Vanity genealogy; Modern genealogy; Major players; ... This might be the time to point to the Mathematics genealogy project. Here is the page for Josiah Gibbs. 

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Switching gears, while looking at our posts, we found this article: 10 New Englanders Turned On By Timothy Leary. Taking a quick look, we saw many familiar names. We might look at this further in terms of genealogy and psychology.    

Remarks: Modified: 08/11/2025

08/11/2025 - 

Semper paratus

TL;DR -- An little known example of being "prepared" is the U.S. Coast Guard which celebrates its 235th birthday this year (this weekend). The Owasco class cutter is one example from the long history of the Coast Guard.

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Of late, we have mentioned the 250th of the U.S. and its defense organizations: U.S. Army; U.S. Navy; U.S. Marines. With these, we will be studying the history of the Revolution. Today, we start to look at the U.S. Coast Guard and its history. 

The U.S. Coast Guard birthday was celebrated at The National WII Museum in New Orleans on 4 Oct 2025. 

DoD's site provided a nice overview of the service provided by the Coast Guard over 235 years. Also, see a definition of "semper paratus" there: always ready. The coast guard got its start with Washington approving expenditures for 10 cutters in 1790. Alexander Hamilton was the founder. 

Much focus might have an emphasis on "domestic" duty of the service. But, the Coast Guard supports the U.S. Navy in times of war. And example was use of the Owasco class cutter during the Vietnam conflict. 

See Vietnam service,
"Crew cititation"

Provisioning at sea
off Vietnam with
USS Guadalupe 

U.S. Navy battleship USS New Jersey and the
U.S. Coast Guard cutter USCGC Owasco (WHEC-39)
off Vietnam in 1968

Paul Switlik (John's brother) served as an Electrician Mate on the USCGC Owasco (WHEC-39) on its Vietnam tour in 68/69. He tells the story of the photo . 

The Stars & Stripes newspapers had us come along side this big baby for the photo shoot. The headline read:

big N & little o says: "No TO THE VIETCONG"

The New Jersey was firing her 16" guns which was shaking the hell out of us. We kept hollering, get us the hell out of here before all of our nuts and bolts come loose.  

Remarks: Modified: 08/05/2025

08/05/2025 - Changed photos to clearer version. Added one for the rendezvous with the USS New Jersey. Included comment by Paul about the photo event with the battleship. 

U.S. Coast Guard History Program