Riverboats played a central role in America's westward expansion in an era that meant booming commerce for our new country. Part of that history of the late 1800's when such vessels navigated the river during the glorious days of riverboat travel was found emerging from the sandy bottom of the Missouri River. The partially submerged wooden steamboat was discovered on the north side of Goat Island, in Cedar County on March 12th by 24-year-old Clint Pinkelman of Hartington. Goat Island, north and east of the tiny village of St. James has ties back to 1804 and the journey of Meriwether Lewis and William Clark. Pvt. George Shannon, the youngest member of the Lewis & Clark party got lost near there and wandered the area for sixteen days before being reunited with the Corps of Discovery. Pinkelman, a hog and grain farmer who lives about 10 miles from Goat Island and the Missouri River was out for the first time this spring in his 18 ft Jon boat. "It was a nice day and I just decided to take the boat out and look at the river," he said. "I noticed someone had recently pushed ice away from the boat ramp at Brookey Bottom and put some new rock down. I headed up river several miles and shut the boat engine off and the current pulled me right to something sticking out of the water." Pinkelman first thought what he saw were parts of an old bridge. He said, "I looked at it a little better and soon figured out it was something that sunk and the low water in the river had exposed it." Pinkelman said he could see about a fourth of boat, which he estimated to be about 160 to 170 feet long and 32 to 35 feet wide sticking above the icy water. Pinkelman had his cell phone along and called his parents, Rick and Mary Pinkelman right away. "It was late in the afternoon and too late for them to come out and see it for themselves, but they believed me right away. Many others didn't believe me when I tried to tell them about what I found. It wasn't until Sunday when I took some of my cousins out to see it; we took a ton of pictures of it," he said. Pinkelman said the steamboat appeared to be in its original location because a stump of a huge cottonwood tree was near the top of what he alleged to be the front of the boat. "It looked like it hit the big snag in the river, went down and never moved again," he said. Pinkelman and his cousins did some serious researching on the Internet and surmised his find might be the remains of the North Alabama, a 220-ton vessel that sank on Oct. 27, 2870. The young men learned that the river channel shifted during the 1881 flood and attempts to locate the wreck with ground penetrating electronic equipment during the summer of 1998 had turned up no trace of the buried vessel. If indeed it were the lost ship North Alabama that sunk 134 years ago, it would have been propelled by steam engines that turned a paddle wheel in the stern of the boat. The actual steamship's design was all part of it is final demise. The power of the great boiling steam engine required large amounts of wood to keep it powered. The old town of St. James, located near Goat Island was one of many riverboat stops were fuel was taken on in large supply. This harvest of vast numbers of cottonwood trees located near the river's edge created the underwater snags that battered the hulls of many ships and an easily torn hall would sink a ship. The lives of these ships, most heading to the gold camps and homesteaders in Montana and West, didn't last long. The average lifespan was only about four years The Missouri River channel has shifted leaving scores of remains of steamboat paddlewheels that once navigated the river during the glorious days of riverboat travel. Historians believe there may be 7-12 shipwrecks in the Mighty Mo between Yankton, S.D. and Sioux City. Pinkelman said he had read that parts of a paddle wheel had been found in this same general area about a year ago. He said after hours of reading information on the Internet, "We decided we better contact someone at the University of South Dakota just across the river. They were excited about the find and wanted to come out to see it and take some pictures." On Saturday morning, Pinkleman and his Dad took three steamboat wreck experts from the USD to the site. Pinkleman said the river was up about a foot since the last time he was there. He estimates that in a few days the old boat would once again be under the murky waters of the Missouri River. "I think the steamboat might have been exposed to the elements all winter due to low water but nobody saw it. Now the water is rising again and it might not be visible till next winter," he said. "They (professors) weren't sure that it was the North Alabama," he said. "They said it could be a military steamboat that sunk somewhere near the same spot. They told us that usually attempts were made to salvage what they could, but that this boat didn't appear to be salvaged. I found a metal fitting that they thought had been connected to the boiler of the boat. They had global positioning equipment (GPS) along that will allow them do some further study on the site and take some aerial photos as well." The experts said they are certain the boat is from the late 1800's and was once a double-rudder paddle-wheel steamboat. Not surprisingly they hope additional research and study will enable the group to pin down what vessel it actually was. Shipwrecks become a part of local legend and researchers say the remains of many of these ships lay awaiting exploration, ready to yield more insight into a long-ago era. There a lot of mysteries still to be solved and discoveries like this help fill that knowledge.

welcome | agenda | articles | map | minutes | partners | tourism