While road building in the East gives a clear picture of the rise
and growth of commerce and trade in that section, it is to the
rivers of the trans-Alleghany country that we must look for a
corresponding picture in this early period. The canoe and pirogue
could handle the packs and kegs brought westward by the files of
Indian ponies; but the heavy loads of the Conestoga wagons
demanded stancher craft. The flatboat and barge therefore served
the West and its commerce as the Conestoga and turnpike served
the East.



CHAPTER V. The Flatboat Age

In the early twenties of the last century one of the popular
songs of the day was "The Hunters of Kentucky." Written by Samuel
Woodworth, the author of "The Old Oaken Bucket," it had
originally been printed in the New York Mirror but had come into
the hands of an actor named Ludlow, who was playing in the old
French theater in New Orleans. The poem chants the praises of the
Kentucky riflemen who fought with Jackson at New Orleans and
indubitably proved

That every man was half a horse
And half an alligator.

Ludlow knew his audience and he saw his chance. Setting the words
to Risk's tune, "Love Laughs" at Locksmiths, donning the costume
of a Western riverman, and arming himself with a long "squirrel"
rifle, he presented himself before the house. The rivermen who