produces three-fourths of our foreign exports. The network of railroads
covering this territory has for a number of years furnished altogether
inadequate transportation facilities, and conditions have grown steadily
worse. Traffic experts throughout the United States have been advising
river improvement as a means of relieving the congestion of freight.
This situation has led to a revival of interest in the deep waterway
from the Lakes to the Gulf which has been talked and written about for
nearly three-quarters of a century.
Photograph by Clinedinst.