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History of steam overcoming sail/handpower

Posted: Wed May 17, 2017 5:52 am
by cyberbadger
Anyone know any interesting statistics or stories?

I thought this was interesting...

Carson, W. Wallace. “Transportation and Traffic on the Ohio and the Mississippi Before the Steamboat.” The Mississippi Valley Historical Review, vol. 7, no. 1, 1920, pp. 26–38. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/1886569.
In 1814 arrivals at New Orleans were as follows:
Flats+Barges: 88,350 tonnage
Steamboats: 2,098 tonnage

The steamboats listed were three in number. The rapid growth of steamboat traffic may be seen in the table of arrivals at New Orleans in 1821:
Flats, barges, and keels: 52,750 tonnage
Steamboats: 54,120 tonnage

The value of the produce received at New Orleans from the interior increased from $9,749,253 in 1815-1816 to $16,771,711 in 1818-1819.
-CB