Road Trip Through History: The Arabia Steamboat Museum
The Arabia Steamboat Museum in Kansas City is a private museum. Like all private museums, it's the result of personal passion. Unlike many private museums, it's big, professionally designed, and stunning.*
The museum weaves together three separate stories into an exciting whole: life in frontier America, the steamboats that served as the semi-trailers of the nineteenth century, and five friends who banded together to excavate one sunken steamboat.
In the nineteenth century, before the Army Corps of Engineers worked its magic, the Missouri River was as treacherous as a navigable river could be. Civil War journalist** Albert Deane Richardson described the river as "a stream of flowing mud studded with dead tree trunks and broken bars." Nonetheless, the Missouri was a major trade route for frontier America and a profitable one. A steamboat could pay for itself with a single successful voyage. Just as well, since the average steamboat only lasted five years on "old Misery". ***
On September 5, 1856, near what is now Kansas City, the steamship Arabia hit a walnut snag that stove in her hull. The ship was lost within minutes. The human passengers all escaped,**** but more than 200 tons of cargo intended for settlements along the river was lost.
Over time, the river shifted, leaving the ship buried forty-five feet deep in what became a farmer's field. The Arabia was buried but not forgotten. Rumors that the ship held treasure (described as everything from gold coins to good Kentucky bourbon) meant there were numerous attempts to excavate it. For 150 years treaasure seekeers failed because the ship was about 100 feet from the river. Everyone who tried to dig was flooded out. In 1988, five families funded a professional excavation, using pumps to keep the site from flooding and the techniques developed during the Mary Rose excavation to preserve the finds.
Today, the artifacts from their excavation are only one part of the exhibit at the Arabia Steamboat museum. The museum also includes explanations of how steamboats worked, part of the Arabia's hull, and a fascinating description of the excavation itself If you're interested in daily life on the frontier, steamboats, or just a good adventure story,***** the Arabia Steamboat Museum is worth a visit.
* Not that I have anything against little museums created with love and imagination on a tight budgett. I've spend many happy hours in quirky storefront museums.
** And Union spy.
*** The Corps of Engineers identified 289 steamboat wrecks in the Missouri when they mapped the river in 1897.
**** One poor mule did not.
***** In my case, that would be yes, yes, and yes.
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A traveler's tip for anyone inclined to come on board the Arabia:
We didn't know until we got there, but the museum is located in a re-built warehouse near the river. City Market is home to a year-round farmer's market on the weekends and year-round food-related tenants. If you have foodie inclinations, leave yourself time to shop and eat.
And we have a history-buff winner!
Several weeks ago I asked you to tell me what kind of history buff you are--and as an incentive I offered a chance to win one of my favorite history books from recent months.
I was pleased (surprised!, stunned!) by the number of people who not only answered, but wrote long thoughtful replies. Here are some of the things I learned:
- Everyone "knows" that the vast majority of history buffs are men. Certainly the audiences for the History Channel and popular history magazines are largely male. Based on my admittedly somewhat smaller sample, I can now say "not so". At least not as far as History in the Margins is concerned.
- Not everyone had a horrible experience with history in school. Some of you had teachers who inspired a love of history. What a relief!
- Most of you have more than one historical period or theme that fascinates you.
- You were pretty much unanimous in giving history-based travel a thumbs-up, even if only in vicarious form.
Thanks for playing.
And now, drum roll please while the cat crawls into the shopping bag to pull out a winner. (A hushed silence falls over the crowd. The suspense is horrible.) And we have a winner! Stephanie, who likes 400-900 CE and the late 16th through the early 17th centuries.
Photograph courtesy of the Library of Congress
History on Display: Faces of the 1st
Last week My Own True Love and I made the long drive to outer suburbia to see a special exhibit at the First Division Museum at Cantigny Park: Faces of the 1st. It was well worth the trip.
Several years ago we happily spent a rainy Memorial Day at the First Division Museum and were fascinated.* The museum does an excellent job of placing the Army's First Division** in historical context--from the division's creation in World War One through the current conflicts.
Faces of the First takes the museum's basic mission and gives it a twist by tightening the focus from the division as a whole to the individual soldier. The exhibits tagline says it all: 17 Soldiers, 7 Conflicts, 1 Division. According to exhibit designer Jaron Kenner, "The point of the exhibit is to put a face to war. Visitors look at personal stories and can identify with them." Using photographs and artifacts from the collections of the soldiers they profile, the museum tells the stories of a diverse group of soldiers. Chaplain, doghandler, nurse, and artilleryman. Boys barely out of high school and men who thought they were too old to be drafted. A professional boxer and a professional drummer as well as career soldiers.***
Some of the stories that gripped my imagination include:
• Marlin Burns' Army and Navy Service Record from WWI which was essentially a baby book detailing a soldier's career. Burns' record included charming sketches that brought his experience to life.
• WWII infantryman and professional drummer Fred Randall who served in the occupation of Germany. His commanding officer asked him to create a nightclub for soldiers stationed in Wurtzberg
• Methodist minister Wes Geary, who enlisted as a chaplain in the Vietnam War at the request of his bishop because the Army Chaplin Corps needed college educated black men. Since he wasn't allowed to carry a weapon, he made himself a slingshot.
Faces of the First successfully put a face on war: seventeen of them in fact. The exhibit runs through September 2. If you're in the area, make the time for a visit. If you're not in the area, check out the exhibit website .
* The re-creation of World War I trenches was particularly memorable. We've seen many versions of this since then, but few are as well done.
** Aka The Big Red One
*** High-ranking officers are the only group not represented: a conscious choice on the part of the museum curators. As Kenner pointed out, war is fought by the everyday soldier.