What the River Carries

The first bridge to connect Hamilton, Illinois, and Keokuk, Iowa, was a drawbridge that opened to wagon, buggy, and train traffic in 1871. Even though the placement of the piers and the nearby pres ence of the treacherous Des Moines Rapids made this, in the opin ion of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, "the worst bridge for the passage of [lumber] rafts, and one of the worst for the passage of steamboats, on the Mississippi River," the bridge stood until 1915, when a new bridge was built on the old pillars. Not long after the first bridge opened, a dispute arose between Iowa and Illinois as to how much each state could tax the owners of the bridge. Iowa claimed the right to tax to the middle of the river. Illinois claimed the right to tax to the navigation or commer cial channel, which at that time and place ran closer to the Iowa than the Illinois bank. The Keokuk & Hamilton Bridge Company complained that because of these different opinions about the lo cation of the state line, it was paying double taxes for 716 feet of the bridge. Was the border at the river's midpoint or at the thal weg, the part of the channel with the greatest depth and fast est flow? The answer to this question had far-reaching implica tions because nine other bridges spanned the Mississippi River between the two states.