Explorers, Egos, and the Search for the Elusive Mississippi River Headwaters

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Today, we all know—assume—that the Mississippi River begins at Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota. How did we figure this out? Why does it matter? In this episode, I dig into the history of how European and American explorers searched the swamps and forests of Minnesota trying to figure out exactly where the Mississippi River springs to life, as well as what motivated their searches. Henry Schoolcraft is usually credited as the person who figured it out, but he had a lot of help, wasn’t even the first Euro-American to visit the lake, and doubters continued to challenge his claim for another 60 years. I finish by asking what exactly we mean by a river’s “source” and wondering if it’s time to think much more broadly about how and where rivers begin.