The Dirschell's are Traveling Again: Tuesday, September 13th

A friend of ours from Florida sent me the link below. It is an article about the Dallas City house I posted about.

https://www.mississippivalleypublishing.com/daily_democrat/renovated-castle-is-part-of-dallas-city-history/article_1558f652-7599-11e8-a779-374b12832b8f.html?utm_medium=social&utm_source=email&utm_campaign=user-share

Good weather again today. Last nights low was 52. Todays high was a sunny 81, to hot but tolerable. We are not looking forward to arriving back in Centertown to 90 degree weather. Last May/June, when we scheduled Doctors appointments for September 20th, we didn't imagine the temperatures would still be in the 90's. Live and learn. Next year I won't be scheduling any summer Doctors appointments between early June and early October.

Hamilton, IL & Keokuk, IA are 12-13 miles downriver from Nauvoo. I wanted to see the lock and dam at Keokuk so we drove down today.

The Mississippi is almost a mile wide in this area. Hugh Cooper was the Engineer who designed and managed the construction of the Keokuk dam and power plant. The dam flooded a lot of low ground both sides of the Mississippi. This area is also called Cooper Lake. I was surprised to learn that the Mississippi is very shallow. The Corps of Engineers are tasked with keeping a 9' deep navigation channel dredged.

Some areas near the shore are full of "lilies" that extend hundreds of yards out into the river/lake.

We had an excellent lunch at the Hamilton Family Cafe. Bowls, not cups, of soup came with the meals. The total bill for my excellent hot beef sandwich and Kathy's good chicken and swiss sandwich was $18.57. Kathy wants to drive back down there for breakfast tomorrow morning. A 6 oz steak and eggs for less than $11.

Are you ready to be bored? The Engineer in me came out looking at bridges, locks and dams.

The story about the Keokuk/Hamilton dam, power plant and lock is interesting. One of the most amazing things is that it was conceived and built as a private enterprise. As part of the deal to get federal government approval to build the dam across the Mississippi they had to agree to build the lock and give it to the government. How different things are today. In Jefferson City a group wants to build a barge terminal, but only if the government forces taxpayers to foot the bill.

The vantage point to see the locks is the upper deck of a bridge across the river. The bridge was opened to traffic in 1916. The lower deck of the swing bridge still carries rail traffic. After a new highway bridge was opened in 1985 the upper deck was closed to vehicles. The Iowa side is used as an observation platform.

Walking out onto the bridge, past the edge of the old brick street.

The street came in from the north while rail traffic came in from the south.

River traffic has the right of way so the swing bridge only closes when a train is ready to cross.

The white shack is set off to the side of tracks, directly above the swing mechanism.

There is more information about the bridge at:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keokuk_Rail_Bridge

https://historicbridges.org/bridges/browser/?bridgebrowser=iowa/keokuk/

A tug was leaving the lock when we arrived. On the way back to Nauvoo we saw a tug with barges headed upstream. I thought there would be more traffic on the river.