European explorers who mapped all the river's channels and backwater areas called it a "gathering of waters." It might also have been called a gathering place of species, including humans. The Native Americans of different tribes who originally lived near the Mississippi and used it for canoe transportattion, hunting and fishing often viewed the great river as the center of the universe.
In 1803 the United States took possession of the river as part of the Louisiana Purchase and brought along a flood of settlement, including trappers, loggers, millers and riverboat captains. Steamboats of the early 19th Century spurred anoher wave of change, helping to establish cities along the Mississippi. Commerce and navigational demands brought levee construction, sandbar removals and other manmade changes to the river. Today the Upper Mississippi has a series of 29 locks and dams that help provide a transportation corridor for the barge and commodities industry.
But it was Mother Nature who first shaped the river through glaciations and melts that left behind mile-wide floodplains that still occasionally fill up with waters. And plant and animal wildlife still have a place despite threats to the Mississippi's complex ecosystem. 40% of North America's duck, geese, swan and wading bird species rely upon the river as a migration corridor. Bald eagles are among the many species of raptors and songbirds that use the flyway. More than 240 fish species inhabit the river's watershed, while otters, beavers, muskrats, foxes and turtles forage alon the Upper Mississippi.
Old Man River, as it became known to African Americans and theater-goers has many uses. Included are some 600 water-oriented parks, biking, fishing and other recreation sites, which draw millions of visitors a year to witness the river's beauty, history and life which surges along with the waters. The uses of the Mississippi are sometimes in conflict. But a shared goal should be to put them into balance so that future generations can also know this gathering place of waters and species in all of its grandeur.
As Mark Twain said, the river is a "wonderful book (with) a new story to tell every day."