The making of the Ohio Valley states, 1660-1837 . ?^ -^;^ BRADDOCKS GRAVE, NATIONAL ROAD. THE FIRST STEAMBOAT 233 THE FIRST STEAMBOAT The evolution in wa3s of travel is a distinct featureof Western growth, and it curiously marks off that growthinto certain well-defined periods. First we have the Ind-ians bark canoe, swift, light, portable; next, the pirogue,shaped out of some great tree, clumsy, slow-moving, butstrong, and so first used by the traders to carry cargoes /. FULTONS STEAMBOAT. about; then comes the flat-boat, or Kentucky ark, createdat the call of the emigrant for a vessel to carr
The making of the Ohio Valley states, 1660-1837 . ?^ -^;^ BRADDOCKS GRAVE, NATIONAL ROAD. THE FIRST STEAMBOAT 233 THE FIRST STEAMBOAT The evolution in wa3s of travel is a distinct featureof Western growth, and it curiously marks off that growthinto certain well-defined periods. First we have the Ind-ians bark canoe, swift, light, portable; next, the pirogue,shaped out of some great tree, clumsy, slow-moving, butstrong, and so first used by the traders to carry cargoes /. FULTONS STEAMBOAT. about; then comes the flat-boat, or Kentucky ark, createdat the call of the emigrant for a vessel to carry himself,his family, his cattle, and household property, all at onetime. When the emigrant had reached his destination,this boat could be knocked to pieces, and the boards usedto build him a house. In every sense of the word, it wasa house-boat. Thus easily do we trace the finger of progress in these 234 THE FIRST STEAMBOAT crude efforts of a crude people ! These boats had carriedtheir thousands, but none of them made any account ofthe value of time. A tiat-boat would float with the cur-rent, from Pittsburg to New Orleans, in seventy-live days—long enough to go round the world in now. Meantime, a puny steam-engine had been put into arude scow, with which, amid scoffings and jeers, RobertFulton pushed out from New York in August, 1807, tobreast the waters of the Hudson. The world knows theresult. Great was the rejoicing when it was known thatthe Clermont had ac
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