8 Sunday, January 20, 2019 The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.

com Water | ways

A LOCAL COMPANION TO:

Sunday, January 20, 2019

2 Sunday, January 20, 2019 The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.com Water | ways Water | ways
History
Continued from Page 3
From there, the waterway project found
status as a banner project the Carter ad-
ministration upheld as an example of how
to construct public work projects with the
support of local communities.
“It went, in less than four years, from
being on the hit list to a project that was rec-
ognized by his administration as a way that
these projects should be built,” Waldon said.
The reality of a vision
It took a few years for the waterway to
live up to its promise. Though the Corps
of Engineers had at one time predicted
more than 25 million tons of commodities
would be shipped on the waterway during
its first year, the reality was closer to 1.7
million tons, according to reporting from
The Dispatch in 1986.
Waldon said apart from it taking time
for shippers to adjust to new routes, some
of the expectations were too high.
“That project had been dreamed of for
generations,” he said. “I will be the first
one to tell you that the expectations were
much too high.”
Industry has increased since the open-
ing, with $8.1 billion annual economic
output, and nearly 25,000 full-time jobs
created thanks to the river. Unexpected
benefits included industries moving to be
closer to the waterway, such as the Steel
Dynamics in Columbus, which last year
employed 740 workers and is in the midst
of a $240 million expansion.
“The steel mill wouldn’t be here today
if not for the waterway,” Hazard said.
The waterway has also boosted tourism
in the county, with hundreds of private
boats and yachts docking at its marinas
every year.
“I’m always amazed that ... younger
people just kind of assume that the water-
way’s been there forever,” Waldon said. “I
don’t mean that in a critical way. It’s part
of the landscape of northeast Mississippi
now. But that obviously is not the case.
It took a lot of effort and a lot of money
by a lot of people and vision. That was
as important as anything. ... They were
visionaries.”
Fishing
Continued from Page 4
sippi TBF Bass Federation State Champi-
onship, Crappie USA and Bass Pro Shop’s
Crappie Masters All-American Tourna-
ment Trail. Fishing tournaments have
just started booking venues for this year.
Carpenter said there are already six tour-
naments coming to Columbus, and the
CVB is bidding for two more. Columbus
has hosted as many as 25 tournaments in
a year, she said.
“Some of them are national, but some
are local and regional,” Carpenter said.
“If it’s something local, we always do
some small things to help them out as
well.”
Most of the fishing during tourna-
ments take place on the Tenn-Tom Wa-
terway because fishers can follow the
currents to different nests of bass and
crappie. The waterway can also connect
fishers to Columbus Lake, which posi-
tions Columbus Marina to profit from the
increased traffic of out-of-town boaters.
“When people come (to the marina)
for tournaments, they’re not just pay-
ing the tournament fees,” Arndt said.
“They’re paying for gas, they’re docking
Sunday, January 20, 2019 7
here for the night. So it goes right back to
the marina and to the economy.”
Bass, crappie, bream and catfish
abound in the waters around Columbus.
Because of that, fishers keep coming
back, Carpenter said.
“This is one of the areas that fisher-
men have told us over the years they en-
joy,” she said. “And they enjoy Columbus
because of the hospitality and because of
the lodging and the culinary choices they
have here.”
Carpenter doesn’t just coordinate fish-
ing tournaments; sometimes, she ends up
winning one. During a promotional event
for a tournament in 2012, she won the
prize for largest crappie caught that day.
“I grew up fishing on my grand-
mother’s lake in Newton County,” she
said. “I was quite the fisherman. That day,
I was out there fishing with a young man
from Tennessee. And then, yes, I caught
the biggest crappie.”
6 Sunday, January 20, 2019
Area paddlers enjoy rich offering of natural wonders
H
aving spent
a healthy
slice of
time in my forma-
tive years on the
Tombigbee in a
ski-boat dodging
stumps, blue rock
and gravel shoals,
it seems like a fit-
ting destiny to be
quietly paddling
a kayak through Birney Imes
those same wa-
ters half a century later.
Only those waters are not the same.
Laws Shoals is gone; so is White Sands, a
sliver of beach below the trestle (in those
days there was only one trestle); and with
the deeper water, the hazards of blue
rock are no more. Even the cable swing
between the mouth of Moore’s Creek and
Ruben’s Fish House has vanished without
a trace.
With the completion of the Tennes-
see-Tombigbee Waterway in the 1980s,
my beloved little Tombigbee disappeared.
Well, not completely. There are vestig-
es of it, on the east side of what is known
locally as The Island and in the oxbows at
places like the Waverly Cut-Off, Hairston
Bend near Camp Pratt and across from
the DeWayne Hayes Recreation Area.
These maze-like formations, the result
of Army Corps of Engineers’ efforts to
straighten the channel for commercial
traffic, are nirvana for the sport fisher-
man and paddlers of kayaks, canoes and
stand-up paddleboards (SUPs). For the
non-motorized explorer, these hidden
passages offer a profusion of natural
wonders.
During a late-afternoon paddle at
Hairston Bend, I had the good fortune
to happen upon and was able to follow a
Recreation
Continued from Page 5
Building a livelihood from boating
Both Miller and Arndt’s livelihoods
depend on boaters. Miller repairs small
“trailerable” boats, the kind that can be
towed behind a pickup, and most of his
customers are local. The marina sees
traffic year-round, mostly from out-of-state the area.
boaters.
“Transient boaters” come to Columbus a night or a couple nights, or even as long
The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.com
Birney Imes/Dispatch Staff
A group of local paddlers pose for a selfie after a fall trip in the old Tombigbee channel
north of Amory. From left: Birney Imes, Ross Whitwam, Matt Alexander, Dudley Bearden,
H.D. Taylor and Chris Weathers.
swimming deer. Blue herons and white paintings.
egrets are abundant, as are mallards and This thought occurred to me as I
wood ducks and occasionally their off- rounded a bend to behold an American
spring. Honking geese are quick to make beautyberry bush laden with magenta
known their displeasure at your presence. berries, rendered by my fogged glasses a
And, occasionally there is a bald eagle, colorful splotch on a green field, a lovely
unmistakably large, majestic and awe-in- impressionistic image. A week or so later,
spiring. I paddled the same stretch hoping for a
As for the flora, there are pink native second look, but the rain and mist were
azaleas in the early spring, followed by gone, and birds had helped themselves to
dogwood, honeysuckle and throughout the berries.
the year, a profusion of wildflowers I can’t The river is capable of other art forms.
identify. On smaller streams like Yellow Creek,
Here’s an image for you: Once in early the Luxapalila and the Buttahatchee, the
fall paddling down Yellow Creek above paddler passes fantastical arrangements
Steens, the misting rain on my glasses, of uprooted trees and natural detritus,
I experienced nature as did the elderly which if could be transported in toto to
Monet (or so I imagined), whose late-in- an exhibit hall of one of the world’s great
life cataracts transformed his vision and museums — say The Prado in Madrid or
Marina from other parts of the country by as a couple months,” Arndt said. “But they
way of the Great Loop, an over 5,000-mile all have the same destination. They’re all
circumnavigation of the East Coast, Great heading to Florida.”
Lakes and Gulf of Mexico done entirely Arndt thinks the marina has an eco-
by boat. Columbus Marina provides fuel, nomic advantage because of its spot on
docking and lodging to those travelers, as the Great Loop route. It’s the only marina
well as a courtesy car so they can explore for about 100 miles in either direction and
it offers appealing amenities that attract
“A lot of transient boaters may stay for visitors.
When Arndt sends off boaters from the
Water | ways
the Met in New York City — would not
only look fitting, but would leave muse-
um-goers astonished by the beauty and
originality of the sculptor’s creations.
The trees, the upright ones, do their
part for the natural beauty of the riverine
landscape. American hollies, their foliage
dark green and dense with red berries,
offered holiday cheer along the But-
tahatchee above Caledonia in the weeks
before Christmas.
When my kayaking buddy H.D. Taylor
is in the mood for crappie, he paddles to a
cypress slough about two miles upstream
from his home on the Luxapalila near the
Highway 50 bridge.
At the back of H.D.’s slough a magnif-
icent swamp chestnut oak towers over a
two-tiered beaver pond. On a summer af-
ternoon a year or two ago I was climbing
out of my kayak for a closer look at one
of the dams when my daughter noticed a
snake entwined in the dam’s infrastruc-
ture. I canceled my inspection.
Recently, with the Luxapalila at flood
stage, I paddled through the slough to
check on the beaver dams. The high
waters had obliterated all traces of the
ponds, the dams and the snake. No doubt,
come spring, they will be back.
One of my kayaking buddies, Larry
Priest, grew up in California. He, like the
rest of us, is bemused by the dearth of
paddlers on these small streams. “If this
were California,” he says, stretching his
arm toward the rippling creek beside us,
“it would be covered with folks.”
Larry’s comment is not a complaint.
Far from it. He, like the few paddlers, who
regularly avail themselves of this wilder-
ness wonderland at our doorstep, consid-
ers his good fortune as he ponders where
his next outing will take him.
Birney Imes (birney@cdispatch.com) is
the former publisher of The Dispatch.
marina, they’re usually using Columbus
Lake as a gateway to the Tenn-Tom Water-
way. Arndt believes the waterway holds
more appeal for boaters than the lake
because the waterway “goes somewhere.”
“People with a boat tend to have a bit of
wanderlust,” he said. “They want to point
to the horizon and go. From here, you can
go to the Great Lakes or the Gulf of Mexi-
co. The sky’s the limit.”
Water | ways The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.com Sunday, January 20, 2019 3
From Carter’s kill list to the largest public works project in US history
The Tenn-Tom Waterway’s path
to fruition was anything but simple
By ISABELLE ALTMAN
ialtman@cdispatch.com
I
t was 95 degrees on June 1, 1985, when approximately
3,000 people crowded the embankment just north of
the Columbus Lock and Dam for the official opening
of the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway — then the larg-
est public works project ever built in the United States.
The ceremony, attended by elected officials from all
over the South, ended with the release of a tank of water
from 23 different states into the waterway, signifying
how the project connected area rivers to the rest of the
country’s inland water system for the first time.
It was that mingling of the waters that then-Dispatch
staff writer George Hazard remembered most about the
ceremony — that and the sweltering heat that popped
several of the 12,000 helium balloons waiting to be re-
leased over the waterway.
“I don’t know if (the heat) caused anyone to speak
more briefly or not,” he said “... (But the mingling of the
waters) was very imaginative. The waters got put into the
Tenn-Tom from other waterways, I believe. ... That was a
Dispatch file photo
nice touch.”
This Dispatch file photo shows the Columbus Lock and Dam as it was being completed in January 1981. The lock is
The ceremony was the culmination of 12 years of one of 10 built throughout the construction of the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway, which connects the Tennessee Riv-
building, fraught with everything from lawsuits attempt- er near Corinth to the Black Warrior-Tombigbee River system in Alabama. The entire waterway was completed in 1984.
ing to halt construction to the project’s inclusion on a
“hit list” of Army Corps of Engineers projects the Jimmy
Tombigbee, though nothing every came of it. More stud- Waldon said much of the opposition came from elected
Carter administration planned to kill. Over that time, the
ies were conducted throughout the 19th and early 20th representatives in the Midwest who objected to the move-
Corps built 10 locks and dredged 300 million cubic yards
centuries, with Congress even authorizing the Corps of ment of industry from their states to the South.
of material to create the 234-mile waterway that connects
Engineers to survey potential routes in 1874. “At that time there were a lot of industries moving out
the Tennessee River near Corinth to the Black War- Waldon said he thought if not for World War II, the of the Rust Belt states ... moving to the South for a lot of
rior-Tombigbee River system near Demopolis, allowing a
Corps of Engineers may have started building the reasons — better labor force,” Waldon said. “And anything
straight shot from the Ohio River to the Gulf of Mexico. waterway as early as the 1940s. As it was, construction that appeared to be accelerating that migration of industries
“It provided, in essence, a shortcut, saved over 800 officially began in the early 1970s. from the upper Midwest to the South, those congressmen
miles of travel for, say, a barge or commerce, moving Construction at the waterway began from either end, and senators automatically just opposed it.”
from east Tennessee or north Alabama down to the gulf,” with the last bit of material being moved in Aberdeen in Columbus hosted a Congressional hearing on the project
said Don Waldon, who was waterway administrator at the December of 1984, Waldon said. at Whitfield Auditorium on Mississippi University for Wom-
time. “That made it very unique.” Hazard was one of the first people to take a boat on en’s campus in 1977.
“What it did was tie into the Tennessee River so that the waterway, who along with another reporter took “You had a lot of congressmen, senators from all over
you’re actually interconnected with all of America’s a ride aboard the towboat “The Eddie Waxler” from the country coming here taking a look and trying to decide
inland waterways now,” local historian Rufus Ward said. Columbus to Aberdeen that winter for a story for The whether this was a project that was worthwhile,” Ward said.
“You don’t dead end in Columbus or Aberdeen some- Dispatch. Waldon said attendance was more than twice the audito-
where. You can go anywhere in the world.” “My memory is it was so cold on that water, whether rium’s capacity.
you were in the towboat or on the deck,” he said. “Natu- “Other than just a handful of people, they were all sup-
Construction and obstacles rally there was a continuous wind. It was extremely cold. portive of the waterway,” Waldon said. “Of course there were
(We) were not sorry to see the lights of the Aberdeen a lot of governors here and congressmen and senators ...
The idea of somehow connecting the Tennessee River
to what was then called the “Mobile River system” had Lock and Dam come into sight.” who spoke out in support of the waterway, and that hearing
been kicked around since before the American Revolu- Before that point, the project ran into plenty of opposi- probably had as much to do with Carter eventually approv-
tion. tion throughout the ‘70s. ing the waterway as anything just because of the strong
“The French were proposing it in the mid-1700s,” “There were several lawsuits,” Ward said. “You had regional support. They weren’t just from Columbus. They
Ward said. everything from railroads suing to private individuals were from Mobile and Paducah, Kentucky, and throughout
Ward said residents of Knox County, Tennessee, peti- who objected to the taking of their land being involved in the region.”
tioned Congress in 1810 to connect the Tennessee to the (those) suits.” See History, page 7
4 Sunday, January 20, 2019
Gone fishing
Lowndes waterways draw casual
and tournament-grade fishermen
By Amanda Lien
alien@cdispatch.com
T
ournament and hobbyist fisherman Larry
Bradford has spent the better part of 30
years on the water. He has fished in several
local and state tournaments, including the Hooks
for Halos Children’s Miracle Network Open Big
Bass Tournament, a 2014 tournament to benefit
Le Bonheur Children’s Hospital, and so he knows
all the best spots to catch a prizewinner.
Sometimes, he admits, they’re not nearby.
Sometimes, fishing for bass and crappie is easier
farther down the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway.
“For me, personally, fishing on (Columbus
Lake) is tough,” he said. “I think it’s because
there’s a lot of pressure on the fish and a lot of peo-
ple go there to make a catch.”
But for Steve Arndt, Columbus Lake is the go-to
place to catch a fish.
“Most of what people do (on the lake) is fish-
ing,” said the general manager of Columbus Mari-
na that sits on the Tenn-Tom Waterway. “They like
The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.com Water | ways Water | ways The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.com Sunday, January 20, 2019 5
Boaters, tubers, water skiers
smaller boat that can be towed to and from
getting on the water and looking at the wildlife.”
Jug fishing – attaching a hook, line and bait to
Visitors, residents the lake, said Steve Arndt, general manag-
Stump Jumpers
Glen Miller, owner of Miller’s Marine and
a water bottle, gallon jug or other receptacle that turn to the water er of Columbus Marina, which sits on the
southeast end of the lake. The convenience
Outdoor Center in Columbus, prefers to boat
floats and setting the contraption loose on the elsewhere on the Tenn-Tom Waterway as part
water – is popular for catching catfish in the lake. for recreation of the lake is what keeps local recreational
boaters coming back, Arndt said.
of the Tombigbee Stump Jumpers, a water
Elsewhere on the Tenn-Tom Waterway, fishers By Amanda Lien skiing club that was founded in the 1950s.
catch bass and crappie, either recreationally or as “People that love boats have it in their “Competition skiing … and recreational
alien@cdispatch.com blood,” Arndt said. “They want to be on the
part of the many fishing tournaments held in Co- skiing was just starting to get organized,” he
J
lumbus throughout the year. boat, they want to be on the water. It’s a great said. “We helped with different organizations
ack Chilcutt remembers how his chil- spot, because it’s so close, to do some tubing
Columbus-Lowndes Convention and Visitors dren “grew up” swimming, fishing and that were doing fundraisers. We could put on
Bureau CEO Nancy Carpenter said that these fish- or some water skiing, or just hop on the boat ski shows just because we had the ability to
water skiing on Columbus Lake. and look at the wildlife and enjoy a sunset.”
ing tournaments have an “enormous” economic “My wife and I used to have our own date do some things back then that were kind of
Chilcutt and his wife, along with a “core unique.”
impact on Columbus. From figures collected over night,” he said. “We’d put all the kids in the group” of neighbors and friends who live on The club stopped putting on water ski
recent years, Carpenter said a fishing tournament inner tube and we’d drag them around while the water, use Columbus Lake for recreation- shows on the waterway in the 1990s, Miller
bringing 200 people to Columbus could “easily” she and I’d have a date in the boat. al boating year-round. It’s just “what you do,” said. But members of the club still get togeth-
bring $200,000 to the city. “Personally, I’m a professional floater,” he he said. er at a spot on the waterway about a mile from
Even before tournaments come to town, com- added. “I like to go out after work when it’s “Even when it’s cool, it’s fun to just ride Friendship Cemetery to ride pontoon boats
petitors may come early to pre-fish. They will warm and float out there, read the paper and around and see all the wildlife and every- and share meals.
spend days testing the waters to find which spot on chill out a little toward the end of the day.” thing,” he added. “During the week, there’s “More people were getting involved in
the waterway offers the most fish that bite the fast- Columbus Lake is one of several bodies of not a lot of activity out there other than water skiing and recreational skiing and our
est. That, too, contributes to the city’s bottom line. water in Lowndes County used for recre- fishermen, so it’s really nice.”
“When you look at nights in a hotel, if they do ational purposes, like water skiing, diving, uniqueness kind of went away,” he said. “It
Chilcutt said the convenience of living was just a natural evolution. As the sport grew,
pre-fishing, and how much they’ll spend on food boating and fishing. The lake is one of two right on the lake makes it difficult for him to
and gas, ($200,000) is really a conservative esti- created by the John C. Stennis Lock and things changed and activities changed, but we
Dispatch file photo justify going anywhere else. stayed organized.”
mate,” Carpenter said. Courtesy photo Water skiing is one of many activ- Dam, and is a popular place for local boaters. “The beauty of (Columbus Lake) is that
In past years, Columbus has hosted the Missis- Fishing on the Tenn-Tom Waterway and Columbus Lake is a popular rec- ities Columbus residents enjoy on Many boaters on Columbus Lake own it’s here,” he said.
See Fishing, page 7 reational or competitive sport for locals and visitors. Columbus Lake. property on or near the water, or have a See Recreation, page 6
4 Sunday, January 20, 2019
Gone fishing
Lowndes waterways draw casual
and tournament-grade fishermen
By Amanda Lien
alien@cdispatch.com
T
ournament and hobbyist fisherman Larry
Bradford has spent the better part of 30
years on the water. He has fished in several
local and state tournaments, including the Hooks
for Halos Children’s Miracle Network Open Big
Bass Tournament, a 2014 tournament to benefit
Le Bonheur Children’s Hospital, and so he knows
all the best spots to catch a prizewinner.
Sometimes, he admits, they’re not nearby.
Sometimes, fishing for bass and crappie is easier
farther down the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway.
“For me, personally, fishing on (Columbus
Lake) is tough,” he said. “I think it’s because
there’s a lot of pressure on the fish and a lot of peo-
ple go there to make a catch.”
But for Steve Arndt, Columbus Lake is the go-to
place to catch a fish.
“Most of what people do (on the lake) is fish-
ing,” said the general manager of Columbus Mari-
na that sits on the Tenn-Tom Waterway. “They like
The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.com Water | ways Water | ways The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.com Sunday, January 20, 2019 5
Boaters, tubers, water skiers
smaller boat that can be towed to and from
getting on the water and looking at the wildlife.”
Jug fishing – attaching a hook, line and bait to
Visitors, residents the lake, said Steve Arndt, general manag-
Stump Jumpers
Glen Miller, owner of Miller’s Marine and
a water bottle, gallon jug or other receptacle that turn to the water er of Columbus Marina, which sits on the
southeast end of the lake. The convenience
Outdoor Center in Columbus, prefers to boat
floats and setting the contraption loose on the elsewhere on the Tenn-Tom Waterway as part
water – is popular for catching catfish in the lake. for recreation of the lake is what keeps local recreational
boaters coming back, Arndt said.
of the Tombigbee Stump Jumpers, a water
Elsewhere on the Tenn-Tom Waterway, fishers By Amanda Lien skiing club that was founded in the 1950s.
catch bass and crappie, either recreationally or as “People that love boats have it in their “Competition skiing … and recreational
alien@cdispatch.com blood,” Arndt said. “They want to be on the
part of the many fishing tournaments held in Co- skiing was just starting to get organized,” he
J
lumbus throughout the year. boat, they want to be on the water. It’s a great said. “We helped with different organizations
ack Chilcutt remembers how his chil- spot, because it’s so close, to do some tubing
Columbus-Lowndes Convention and Visitors dren “grew up” swimming, fishing and that were doing fundraisers. We could put on
Bureau CEO Nancy Carpenter said that these fish- or some water skiing, or just hop on the boat ski shows just because we had the ability to
water skiing on Columbus Lake. and look at the wildlife and enjoy a sunset.”
ing tournaments have an “enormous” economic “My wife and I used to have our own date do some things back then that were kind of
Chilcutt and his wife, along with a “core unique.”
impact on Columbus. From figures collected over night,” he said. “We’d put all the kids in the group” of neighbors and friends who live on The club stopped putting on water ski
recent years, Carpenter said a fishing tournament inner tube and we’d drag them around while the water, use Columbus Lake for recreation- shows on the waterway in the 1990s, Miller
bringing 200 people to Columbus could “easily” she and I’d have a date in the boat. al boating year-round. It’s just “what you do,” said. But members of the club still get togeth-
bring $200,000 to the city. “Personally, I’m a professional floater,” he he said. er at a spot on the waterway about a mile from
Even before tournaments come to town, com- added. “I like to go out after work when it’s “Even when it’s cool, it’s fun to just ride Friendship Cemetery to ride pontoon boats
petitors may come early to pre-fish. They will warm and float out there, read the paper and around and see all the wildlife and every- and share meals.
spend days testing the waters to find which spot on chill out a little toward the end of the day.” thing,” he added. “During the week, there’s “More people were getting involved in
the waterway offers the most fish that bite the fast- Columbus Lake is one of several bodies of not a lot of activity out there other than water skiing and recreational skiing and our
est. That, too, contributes to the city’s bottom line. water in Lowndes County used for recre- fishermen, so it’s really nice.”
“When you look at nights in a hotel, if they do ational purposes, like water skiing, diving, uniqueness kind of went away,” he said. “It
Chilcutt said the convenience of living was just a natural evolution. As the sport grew,
pre-fishing, and how much they’ll spend on food boating and fishing. The lake is one of two right on the lake makes it difficult for him to
and gas, ($200,000) is really a conservative esti- created by the John C. Stennis Lock and things changed and activities changed, but we
Dispatch file photo justify going anywhere else. stayed organized.”
mate,” Carpenter said. Courtesy photo Water skiing is one of many activ- Dam, and is a popular place for local boaters. “The beauty of (Columbus Lake) is that
In past years, Columbus has hosted the Missis- Fishing on the Tenn-Tom Waterway and Columbus Lake is a popular rec- ities Columbus residents enjoy on Many boaters on Columbus Lake own it’s here,” he said.
See Fishing, page 7 reational or competitive sport for locals and visitors. Columbus Lake. property on or near the water, or have a See Recreation, page 6
6 Sunday, January 20, 2019
Area paddlers enjoy rich offering of natural wonders
H
aving spent
a healthy
slice of
time in my forma-
tive years on the
Tombigbee in a
ski-boat dodging
stumps, blue rock
and gravel shoals,
it seems like a fit-
ting destiny to be
quietly paddling
a kayak through Birney Imes
those same wa-
ters half a century later.
Only those waters are not the same.
Laws Shoals is gone; so is White Sands, a
sliver of beach below the trestle (in those
days there was only one trestle); and with
the deeper water, the hazards of blue
rock are no more. Even the cable swing
between the mouth of Moore’s Creek and
Ruben’s Fish House has vanished without
a trace.
With the completion of the Tennes-
see-Tombigbee Waterway in the 1980s,
my beloved little Tombigbee disappeared.
Well, not completely. There are vestig-
es of it, on the east side of what is known
locally as The Island and in the oxbows at
places like the Waverly Cut-Off, Hairston
Bend near Camp Pratt and across from
the DeWayne Hayes Recreation Area.
These maze-like formations, the result
of Army Corps of Engineers’ efforts to
straighten the channel for commercial
traffic, are nirvana for the sport fisher-
man and paddlers of kayaks, canoes and
stand-up paddleboards (SUPs). For the
non-motorized explorer, these hidden
passages offer a profusion of natural
wonders.
During a late-afternoon paddle at
Hairston Bend, I had the good fortune
to happen upon and was able to follow a
Recreation
Continued from Page 5
Building a livelihood from boating
Both Miller and Arndt’s livelihoods
depend on boaters. Miller repairs small
“trailerable” boats, the kind that can be
towed behind a pickup, and most of his
customers are local. The marina sees
traffic year-round, mostly from out-of-state the area.
boaters.
“Transient boaters” come to Columbus a night or a couple nights, or even as long
The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.com
Birney Imes/Dispatch Staff
A group of local paddlers pose for a selfie after a fall trip in the old Tombigbee channel
north of Amory. From left: Birney Imes, Ross Whitwam, Matt Alexander, Dudley Bearden,
H.D. Taylor and Chris Weathers.
swimming deer. Blue herons and white paintings.
egrets are abundant, as are mallards and This thought occurred to me as I
wood ducks and occasionally their off- rounded a bend to behold an American
spring. Honking geese are quick to make beautyberry bush laden with magenta
known their displeasure at your presence. berries, rendered by my fogged glasses a
And, occasionally there is a bald eagle, colorful splotch on a green field, a lovely
unmistakably large, majestic and awe-in- impressionistic image. A week or so later,
spiring. I paddled the same stretch hoping for a
As for the flora, there are pink native second look, but the rain and mist were
azaleas in the early spring, followed by gone, and birds had helped themselves to
dogwood, honeysuckle and throughout the berries.
the year, a profusion of wildflowers I can’t The river is capable of other art forms.
identify. On smaller streams like Yellow Creek,
Here’s an image for you: Once in early the Luxapalila and the Buttahatchee, the
fall paddling down Yellow Creek above paddler passes fantastical arrangements
Steens, the misting rain on my glasses, of uprooted trees and natural detritus,
I experienced nature as did the elderly which if could be transported in toto to
Monet (or so I imagined), whose late-in- an exhibit hall of one of the world’s great
life cataracts transformed his vision and museums — say The Prado in Madrid or
Marina from other parts of the country by as a couple months,” Arndt said. “But they
way of the Great Loop, an over 5,000-mile all have the same destination. They’re all
circumnavigation of the East Coast, Great heading to Florida.”
Lakes and Gulf of Mexico done entirely Arndt thinks the marina has an eco-
by boat. Columbus Marina provides fuel, nomic advantage because of its spot on
docking and lodging to those travelers, as the Great Loop route. It’s the only marina
well as a courtesy car so they can explore for about 100 miles in either direction and
it offers appealing amenities that attract
“A lot of transient boaters may stay for visitors.
When Arndt sends off boaters from the
Water | ways
the Met in New York City — would not
only look fitting, but would leave muse-
um-goers astonished by the beauty and
originality of the sculptor’s creations.
The trees, the upright ones, do their
part for the natural beauty of the riverine
landscape. American hollies, their foliage
dark green and dense with red berries,
offered holiday cheer along the But-
tahatchee above Caledonia in the weeks
before Christmas.
When my kayaking buddy H.D. Taylor
is in the mood for crappie, he paddles to a
cypress slough about two miles upstream
from his home on the Luxapalila near the
Highway 50 bridge.
At the back of H.D.’s slough a magnif-
icent swamp chestnut oak towers over a
two-tiered beaver pond. On a summer af-
ternoon a year or two ago I was climbing
out of my kayak for a closer look at one
of the dams when my daughter noticed a
snake entwined in the dam’s infrastruc-
ture. I canceled my inspection.
Recently, with the Luxapalila at flood
stage, I paddled through the slough to
check on the beaver dams. The high
waters had obliterated all traces of the
ponds, the dams and the snake. No doubt,
come spring, they will be back.
One of my kayaking buddies, Larry
Priest, grew up in California. He, like the
rest of us, is bemused by the dearth of
paddlers on these small streams. “If this
were California,” he says, stretching his
arm toward the rippling creek beside us,
“it would be covered with folks.”
Larry’s comment is not a complaint.
Far from it. He, like the few paddlers, who
regularly avail themselves of this wilder-
ness wonderland at our doorstep, consid-
ers his good fortune as he ponders where
his next outing will take him.
Birney Imes (birney@cdispatch.com) is
the former publisher of The Dispatch.
marina, they’re usually using Columbus
Lake as a gateway to the Tenn-Tom Water-
way. Arndt believes the waterway holds
more appeal for boaters than the lake
because the waterway “goes somewhere.”
“People with a boat tend to have a bit of
wanderlust,” he said. “They want to point
to the horizon and go. From here, you can
go to the Great Lakes or the Gulf of Mexi-
co. The sky’s the limit.”
Water | ways The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.com Sunday, January 20, 2019 3
From Carter’s kill list to the largest public works project in US history
The Tenn-Tom Waterway’s path
to fruition was anything but simple
By ISABELLE ALTMAN
ialtman@cdispatch.com
I
t was 95 degrees on June 1, 1985, when approximately
3,000 people crowded the embankment just north of
the Columbus Lock and Dam for the official opening
of the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway — then the larg-
est public works project ever built in the United States.
The ceremony, attended by elected officials from all
over the South, ended with the release of a tank of water
from 23 different states into the waterway, signifying
how the project connected area rivers to the rest of the
country’s inland water system for the first time.
It was that mingling of the waters that then-Dispatch
staff writer George Hazard remembered most about the
ceremony — that and the sweltering heat that popped
several of the 12,000 helium balloons waiting to be re-
leased over the waterway.
“I don’t know if (the heat) caused anyone to speak
more briefly or not,” he said “... (But the mingling of the
waters) was very imaginative. The waters got put into the
Tenn-Tom from other waterways, I believe. ... That was a
Dispatch file photo
nice touch.”
This Dispatch file photo shows the Columbus Lock and Dam as it was being completed in January 1981. The lock is
The ceremony was the culmination of 12 years of one of 10 built throughout the construction of the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway, which connects the Tennessee Riv-
building, fraught with everything from lawsuits attempt- er near Corinth to the Black Warrior-Tombigbee River system in Alabama. The entire waterway was completed in 1984.
ing to halt construction to the project’s inclusion on a
“hit list” of Army Corps of Engineers projects the Jimmy
Tombigbee, though nothing every came of it. More stud- Waldon said much of the opposition came from elected
Carter administration planned to kill. Over that time, the
ies were conducted throughout the 19th and early 20th representatives in the Midwest who objected to the move-
Corps built 10 locks and dredged 300 million cubic yards
centuries, with Congress even authorizing the Corps of ment of industry from their states to the South.
of material to create the 234-mile waterway that connects
Engineers to survey potential routes in 1874. “At that time there were a lot of industries moving out
the Tennessee River near Corinth to the Black War- Waldon said he thought if not for World War II, the of the Rust Belt states ... moving to the South for a lot of
rior-Tombigbee River system near Demopolis, allowing a
Corps of Engineers may have started building the reasons — better labor force,” Waldon said. “And anything
straight shot from the Ohio River to the Gulf of Mexico. waterway as early as the 1940s. As it was, construction that appeared to be accelerating that migration of industries
“It provided, in essence, a shortcut, saved over 800 officially began in the early 1970s. from the upper Midwest to the South, those congressmen
miles of travel for, say, a barge or commerce, moving Construction at the waterway began from either end, and senators automatically just opposed it.”
from east Tennessee or north Alabama down to the gulf,” with the last bit of material being moved in Aberdeen in Columbus hosted a Congressional hearing on the project
said Don Waldon, who was waterway administrator at the December of 1984, Waldon said. at Whitfield Auditorium on Mississippi University for Wom-
time. “That made it very unique.” Hazard was one of the first people to take a boat on en’s campus in 1977.
“What it did was tie into the Tennessee River so that the waterway, who along with another reporter took “You had a lot of congressmen, senators from all over
you’re actually interconnected with all of America’s a ride aboard the towboat “The Eddie Waxler” from the country coming here taking a look and trying to decide
inland waterways now,” local historian Rufus Ward said. Columbus to Aberdeen that winter for a story for The whether this was a project that was worthwhile,” Ward said.
“You don’t dead end in Columbus or Aberdeen some- Dispatch. Waldon said attendance was more than twice the audito-
where. You can go anywhere in the world.” “My memory is it was so cold on that water, whether rium’s capacity.
you were in the towboat or on the deck,” he said. “Natu- “Other than just a handful of people, they were all sup-
Construction and obstacles rally there was a continuous wind. It was extremely cold. portive of the waterway,” Waldon said. “Of course there were
(We) were not sorry to see the lights of the Aberdeen a lot of governors here and congressmen and senators ...
The idea of somehow connecting the Tennessee River
to what was then called the “Mobile River system” had Lock and Dam come into sight.” who spoke out in support of the waterway, and that hearing
been kicked around since before the American Revolu- Before that point, the project ran into plenty of opposi- probably had as much to do with Carter eventually approv-
tion. tion throughout the ‘70s. ing the waterway as anything just because of the strong
“The French were proposing it in the mid-1700s,” “There were several lawsuits,” Ward said. “You had regional support. They weren’t just from Columbus. They
Ward said. everything from railroads suing to private individuals were from Mobile and Paducah, Kentucky, and throughout
Ward said residents of Knox County, Tennessee, peti- who objected to the taking of their land being involved in the region.”
tioned Congress in 1810 to connect the Tennessee to the (those) suits.” See History, page 7
2 Sunday, January 20, 2019 The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.com Water | ways Water | ways
History
Continued from Page 3
From there, the waterway project found
status as a banner project the Carter ad-
ministration upheld as an example of how
to construct public work projects with the
support of local communities.
“It went, in less than four years, from
being on the hit list to a project that was rec-
ognized by his administration as a way that
these projects should be built,” Waldon said.
The reality of a vision
It took a few years for the waterway to
live up to its promise. Though the Corps
of Engineers had at one time predicted
more than 25 million tons of commodities
would be shipped on the waterway during
its first year, the reality was closer to 1.7
million tons, according to reporting from
The Dispatch in 1986.
Waldon said apart from it taking time
for shippers to adjust to new routes, some
of the expectations were too high.
“That project had been dreamed of for
generations,” he said. “I will be the first
one to tell you that the expectations were
much too high.”
Industry has increased since the open-
ing, with $8.1 billion annual economic
output, and nearly 25,000 full-time jobs
created thanks to the river. Unexpected
benefits included industries moving to be
closer to the waterway, such as the Steel
Dynamics in Columbus, which last year
employed 740 workers and is in the midst
of a $240 million expansion.
“The steel mill wouldn’t be here today
if not for the waterway,” Hazard said.
The waterway has also boosted tourism
in the county, with hundreds of private
boats and yachts docking at its marinas
every year.
“I’m always amazed that ... younger
people just kind of assume that the water-
way’s been there forever,” Waldon said. “I
don’t mean that in a critical way. It’s part
of the landscape of northeast Mississippi
now. But that obviously is not the case.
It took a lot of effort and a lot of money
by a lot of people and vision. That was
as important as anything. ... They were
visionaries.”
Fishing
Continued from Page 4
sippi TBF Bass Federation State Champi-
onship, Crappie USA and Bass Pro Shop’s
Crappie Masters All-American Tourna-
ment Trail. Fishing tournaments have
just started booking venues for this year.
Carpenter said there are already six tour-
naments coming to Columbus, and the
CVB is bidding for two more. Columbus
has hosted as many as 25 tournaments in
a year, she said.
“Some of them are national, but some
are local and regional,” Carpenter said.
“If it’s something local, we always do
some small things to help them out as
well.”
Most of the fishing during tourna-
ments take place on the Tenn-Tom Wa-
terway because fishers can follow the
currents to different nests of bass and
crappie. The waterway can also connect
fishers to Columbus Lake, which posi-
tions Columbus Marina to profit from the
increased traffic of out-of-town boaters.
“When people come (to the marina)
for tournaments, they’re not just pay-
ing the tournament fees,” Arndt said.
“They’re paying for gas, they’re docking
Sunday, January 20, 2019 7
here for the night. So it goes right back to
the marina and to the economy.”
Bass, crappie, bream and catfish
abound in the waters around Columbus.
Because of that, fishers keep coming
back, Carpenter said.
“This is one of the areas that fisher-
men have told us over the years they en-
joy,” she said. “And they enjoy Columbus
because of the hospitality and because of
the lodging and the culinary choices they
have here.”
Carpenter doesn’t just coordinate fish-
ing tournaments; sometimes, she ends up
winning one. During a promotional event
for a tournament in 2012, she won the
prize for largest crappie caught that day.
“I grew up fishing on my grand-
mother’s lake in Newton County,” she
said. “I was quite the fisherman. That day,
I was out there fishing with a young man
from Tennessee. And then, yes, I caught
the biggest crappie.”
8 Sunday, January 20, 2019 The Dispatch • www.cdispatch.com Water | ways
A LOCAL COMPANION TO:

Sunday, January 20, 2019