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A Man, A Plan, A Canal: Oklahoma
(Reworked from episode broadcast on January 17, 2001)
January 15, 2003
 Listen  Historian's Notes Resources Transcript
Historian's Notes
Having been a landlocked state for millions of years, one can only imagine the excitement of finally
watching a barge, which began its journey in the Atlantic or Pacific Ocean, enter the state. The idea
of connecting the state to the ocean was the dream of Senator Robert S. Kerr. Because of his hard work
and imagination -- not to mention his ability to grind favors from other politicians -- Oklahoma was able
to realize a completely new market for goods both entering and leaving the state. The Kerr-McClellan waterway is a priceless asset for Oklahoma and is celebrated as such on this segment of the Almanac.
Resources
Material for this segment came from a variety of standard Oklahoma history
texts.
Almanac Transcript
A man, a plan, a canal: Oklahoma, this week on the Oklahoma Audio Almanac.
Hello, I am Steven Knoche Kite.
Oklahoma's two main river systems, the Red River and the Arkansas River, has always proven excellent
means of transportation for early-day as well as modern residents. From the earliest recorded history
of the region until the arrival of the more convenient and reliable railroad, the Arkansas River, the
more navigable of the two systems, was heavily utilized as a trade route. Because of the railroad, though,
river travel beginning in the 1870s entered a 70-year period of stagnation.
Elected governor of Oklahoma in 1943, Robert S. Kerr put into action an ambitious plan that would forever
change travel and commerce in the state. Kerr proposed the canal system connecting the Arkansas River
and its main tributary, the Verdigris, to the Mississippi. This canal plan of Kerr's would have two main
benefits for the residents of northeastern Oklahoma. First, they would connect the northeastern section
of the state to the Gulf of Mexico, theoretically providing unlimited industrial opportunities; and second,
a system of locks, dams, and canals would help to tame the wild waters of the Verdigris, whose annual
floods wreaked havoc on nearby towns. The canal project officially began in 1943.
With Kerr's election to the U.S. Senate in 1945 and with the help of Arkansas Senator John McClellan,
the project began to progress rapidly. Kerr wrangled, manhandled, and bullied funds from Congress for
his project, whose cost soared into the billions. The Kerr-McClellan Navigation System, as it is called,
is one of the most expensive civil projects in U.S. history behind the Panama Canal and the U.S. Space
program. When finished a fully navigable route lay from the Gulf of Mexico to the mouth of the Verdigris
River in northeastern Oklahoma.
The Oklahoma portion contains no less than 448 miles of constructed river channel, five locks, three
lakes: Eufaula, Keystone, and Oologah. It was a long an arduous process taking over 28 years to complete,
but it was in this week of January 1971 when the first commercial barge made its way from the Gulf of
Mexico, up the Mississippi and into the Port of Catoosa, thereby marking the official opening of the Kerr-McClellan
Navigation System: Oklahoma's waterway to the sea.
I'm Steven Knoche Kite.
The Oklahoma Audio Almanac is a joint production of the Oklahoma State University
Library and Oklahoma's Public Radio.
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