Adrift on America's big, lost, still-wild river

Well, here we are, one week away from the official publication of The Great River. I’ve already started recording podcast interviews, and a few questions have come up repeatedly.

One is, basically, what’s the sale pitch? Why should anyone care about this river—especially people who might not live on its banks? The first few times I answered this, I talked about how the Mississippi River turned America into what it is: this vast and fertile watershed, and this network of waterways linking the territory, helped unleash an empire. Eventually, though, I started talking about the future. Climate change means chaos, but the Mississippi River has always been chaos. If we want to know how to live in the future, it makes sense to pay attention to how people survived along this river for thousands of years.

The other big question: What do you want people to take away from this book? And that one’s easy. I want you to get to know the river—and hopefully love it.

---

A reminder, then:

In conjunction with the release of the book, there are several ways to get to know and love the river. (Please feel free to forward this email widely, or share it on social media!)

The more daring approach is to join me and the legendary John Ruskey on a three-day, two-night paddle trip in late June. More details here.

I don’t yet have a swanky graphic for the second option, but I am very excited about it: I’m working with chef Marcus Jacobs of Porgy’s Seafood to host a four-course dinner telling the river’s story through food. We’ll talk about what the river’s abundance has meant to Indigenous people, and how plantation-style, industrialized farming has reshaped the river—and what hope there is for the future. Details here.

---

Given the release date, just seven days remain to enter the Mississippi River party pack raffle. Send me those receipts! Details here.

That’s it for now! I’ve got some big ideas for the coming months, though, so I’ll be updating y’all on the future of this newsletter soon.

(Note that there are more events on my website, including Greenville, MS, and a second Jackson, plus upper river stops in LaCrosse, WI; Winona, MN; and Minneapolis.)

---

River roundup

“Land in the Delta does not stand still. It surrenders, sinks, bubbles back up. What is buried here rarely stays buried.”

• I knew for The Great River I’d have to write a chapter about the modern impacts of the farming regime that’s emerged atop the Mississippi’s floodplain—which wound up sending me on an extended road-trip ramble in the Arkansas Delta. So I was delighted to encounter this meditative essay by Timothy Schuler in For Places Journal about the region, which is funky and beautiful and too often overshadowed by the Mississippi Delta across the river. Highly recommended reading.

• One of the other questions I’ve been asked is whether the Army Corps of Engineers is the villain of my book. My response is that we have to wait and see: there’s a study afoot now that will determine the river’s future; what the Corps decides in that study will reveal how much they’ve learned. The Dirt, though, offers some encouraging news: the Corps is instituting new policies that will help ensure that nature-based engineering approaches are given due consideration.

• Down in the river delta, meanwhile, the seafood troubles continue: an iconic Mississippi restaurant has been caught selling mislabeled food (Times-Picayune). In happier news, a big-name New Orleans chef wants to train the next generation of Louisiana deckhands (Axios).

• The other trouble in the delta is government: our (awful) new governor may soon dismantle the agency working to save our imperiled coast. The Washington Post reports on efforts to save it.

---

Southern Roundup

• Twelve miles of the Blue Ridge Parkway were closed outside of Asheville after a shooting (National Parks Traveler).

---

Southern nature jobs

Healthy Gulf has a number of openings: for a staff scientist, a chief development officer, and a coastal organizer.