Who might Huck Finn have met if he took his journey today? Explore this question through activities for younger and older students. Or see the journey through Huck Finn's eyes with the Historic Maps of Interest. Your Mission   Briefing   Activities   Historic Maps of Interest   Mark Twain in the Classroom

Retrace the journey of Huck Finn down the Mississippi River and discover what you can learn from the cultures you encounter along the way and what you might take home to share with your friends and family.

Are you ready for a big family vacation? Imagine that one of your parents has asked you to accompany him or her on a cross-country trip from Minnesota to the Golf of Mexico, retracing the steps of Huck Finn.  Now all you can think about is what it will look like there, what the people will be like, what you should pack, and what your friends and relatives will want you to bring back to share with them. (You can let your mom or dad worry about everything else.)

Perhaps Huck Finn wondered about these things.  Here is a description of the route that Huck and Jim would take up the Mississippi River.

Geography of the Mississippi River

The Upper Mississippi originates at Lake Itasca, flows through the Twin Cities, and borders southern Minnesota, southern Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, and Missouri. The Lower Region begins where the Ohio River drains into the Mississippi, and edges southern Missouri, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Mississippi, and northern Louisiana. The Mississippi then branches into smaller channels before disappearing into the Gulf of Mexico.

The ten states that border the Mississippi form the central heart of our vast nation as the river connects far-away regions and facilitates the exchange of trade, industrial products, knowledge, and the arts. Yet the river's length encompasses at least two distinct sections based on geography and climate.

The two regions share a river, but are as different as a Minnesota moose is to a Louisiana alligator! Neighborhoods in the Lower Mississippi Region retain a French or Spanish flair with added dashes of Caribbean and African customs. The Upper Region was primarily settled by people of Scandinavian, German, and Irish descent.

Settlement was slower in the north due to shallow rapids and winter accumulations of ice and snow. The smaller communities that were established here relied on local services before 20th century locks and dams introduced a smooth flow of commerce. In contrast, the lower Mississippi ran freely to the Gulf past deep, rich soil steaming under the hot sun. Grand plantations fueled by slave labor supplied America and much of the world with cotton, sugar, and rice.

The institution of slavery ultimately shaped the entire history of the United States, from war to racism to Civil Rights. And from lowly African field hollers sprang the blues, jazz, and rock and roll. Add a liberal dose of talent from the poets, writers, artists, and adventurers who had spent much of their lives along the Mississippi, and modern America was born!

From flatboats to keelboats to steamboats, life on the Mississippi was a world apart from life on land. Early flatboatmen and keelboatmen led a hard life as they guided their cargo to New Orleans, constantly on the lookout for eddies, sunken trees, and river pirates!

With the advent of steam, however, the public quickly demanded accommodation. Floating palaces appeared with gambling parlors and beautifully decked saloons. Showboats provided dockside entertainment that was enthusiastically welcomed by people living in the river towns. Other river characters included a steady stream of immigrants who arrived in Missouri, Iowa, and Illinois after gaining entrance to America through the port city of New Orleans.

There can be no name more synonymous with the river than Samuel Clemens, more familiarly known as Mark Twain. In books such as Life on the Mississippi, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Twain captured the meaning of 19th century river days.

Today, 175 million tons of freight moves on the Mississippi each year. Grains are carried south along with coal from Illinois and western Kentucky. North from the Texas oil fields and Louisiana come gasoline and fuel oil. But rafts, pleasure boats and steamboat casinos still create their own "river days" up and down the river!

Younger:  Draw pictures of yourself meeting some of the people along Huck Finn's route, and write a story to go along with your pictures. What do you think you'd say to each other, and what things would you show each other? What would you tell them about your home, and what would they tell you about theirs?

Show students maps of the United States in 1800's and the route that Huck and Jim would take up the Mississippi River.  Students can color their own copies of the maps based on the models provided.

Older: Retrace Huck Finn's journey to see the landscapes and cultures for yourself and to learn some interesting new things to share with your friends and family back home.  Before departing, don't forget to pack some items to trade with the people you meet—perhaps a baseball cap, T-shirt, or pictures of your hometown.

Use the Internet links to see what it's like in some of the places Huck Finn visited. Visit at least three places, and label them on the map. Choose at least one thing to bring back home from each place you go—it can be an object (maybe a type of clothing or tool) or an idea (perhaps an interesting custom or game). Then draw pictures of the things you'd like to take home. Write a description of each of these things, and explain why you'd like to take them home.

Historic Maps of Interest

Lloyd's map of the lower Mississippi River from St. Louis to the Gulf of Mexico; compiled from Government surveys in the Topographical Bureau, Washington, D.C. Detailed map of the river from St. Louis to the Gulf of Mexico, produced in 1863, in the Maps collection, Library of Congress.

Cairo, Il[linois] 1867. Drawn from nature by A. Ruger.  An aerial view map of Jim's intended destination, made in 1867, in the Panoramic Maps collection, Library of Congress.

Cairo, Illinois
A different aerial view map made in 1888, in the Panoramic Maps collection, Library of Congress.

Illinois
D. B. Cooke & Co. railroad map, made in 1855, in the Maps collection, Library of Congress.

Arkansas
Colton's railroad & township map of Arkansas, made in 1854, in the Maps collection, Library of Congress.

Cairo & Fulton Railroad
Map made in 1853 that shows the route of the Mississippi River and many of the towns along it from Missouri to New Orleans, in the Maps collection, Library of Congress.

Cairo & Fulton Railroad
A more detailed map of the railroad route produced in 1871, in the Maps collection, Library of Congress.

• http://www.filmeducation.org/filmlib/HuckFinn.pdf 
• http://www.msu.edu/~miazgama/huckfinn.htm
• http://cgee.hamline.edu/rivers/Resources/river_days/info.html
• You can learn more about the Mississippi - "Old Man River"

Mark Twain in the Classroom

There can be no name more synonymous with the Mighty Mississippi River than Samuel Clemens, more familiarly known as Mark Twain. In books such as Life on the Mississippi, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, Twain captured the meaning of 19th century river days.

Here is a list of some of our favorite sites on Mark Twain from the World Wide Web.

• Mark Twain (PBS) Known to Everyone - Liked by All 
  • Find classroom activities, selected writings, a chronology of Twain’s life, and links to related Web sites. Visit Learn More.  Filmmakers Behind the Scenes - Go behind-the-scenes at Florentine Films with filmmakers Ken Burns and Dayton Duncan.
• The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - "Flow Day"
  • The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, perhaps the most controversial book taught in American high schools, demands plenty of introductory activities. Without an understanding of the era in which it was written, and a knowledge of the views of the author and his use of satire, students will be left without a context to guide them through the reading of the novel.
• Mark Twain - In His Times
  • This interpretive archive, drawn largely from the resources of the Barrett Collection, focuses on how "Mark Twain" and his works were created and defined, marketed and performed, reviewed and appreciated. The goal is to allow readers, scholars, students and teachers to see what Mark Twain and His Times said about each other, in a way that can speak to us today.