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Show The First Steamar on the Stlnsisaippl. In the year 1811 Nicholas J. Roosevelt built a steamer at Pittsbnrg, after first getting a permit from Fulton and Livingstone. Liv-ingstone. Fulton furnished the plans for the boat, which was called the New Orleans. It was a stern wheeler of about 200 tons burden, and was also pro-Tided pro-Tided with sails, which were used when the wind was fair. The hull of this pioneer Mississippi craft was 188 feet in length, 80 feet beam, and the cost of the whole, including engines, has been figured fig-ured at about $10,000. Roosevelt and his family, with an engineer, pilot and six deck hands, left Pittsburg Oct 11, 1811, and reached New Orleans two weeks later. When the New Orleans rode down the Ohio and out into the broad waters of the Mississippi that October Oc-tober morning seventy-nine years ago she marked a new era in the history of the "Great West." St. Louis Republic. |