Old Man River : the Mississippi River in North American history / Paul Schneider.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Prologue -- Prelude: The American watershed -- Book one. River of giants : continents collide, glaciers recede, mastodons bellow and humans arrive -- Ice on the rocks -- The Missouri leviathan -- Broken arrows -- Mammoth season -- Book two. River of mounds -- The rise and fall, and rise and fall, and rise of Native America -- Among the effigies -- Poverty point -- 35,000 pearls -- Among the Mississippians -- The great serpent -- Book three. River of fortune -- The Spanish exit, the French arrive, the Iroquois take action -- Bonjour Great Khan -- In the Iroquois longhouse -- The American bottom -- The Illinois Country -- Adrift -- The incomparable La Salle -- Nous sommes tous sauvages -- The wrath -- If the river don't rise -- Book four. River of empires -- The English enter, the French exit, the Iroquois negotiate, and the Americans take over -- The scramble for the Forks -- The half king -- Adieu New France -- The American watershed -- Allegheny mornings -- Book six. Life on the Mississippi -- Flatboats and keelboats, steamboats and showboats, slave boats and warships -- Down a lazy river -- I long to see you -- Up the wicked river -- All aboard -- Down below -- Blood on the tracks -- Anaconda -- Down in flames -- Book seven. On the lake of the engineers -- The mouth -- All the lists of Clay -- Old Man River.