Who was Captain Henry Miller Shreve?
In 1833, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers hired a steamboat captain named Henry Miller Shreve to clear the Red River of the infamous Great Raft, a 165-mile long continuous pile of organic debris that had clogged the river from Loggy Bayou to Hurricane Bluffs and prevented transportation by boat. Captain Shreve had already pioneered steamboat navigation on the Ohio River, the Mississippi River and the Red River, and he had also significantly improved steamboats by adding separate boilers to power side paddlewheels independently and multiple decks to accommodate more passengers and entertainment for the passengers. With the assistance of a specially modified riverboat named the Heliopolis, 4 other steamboats and about 160 men, Captain Shreve cleared the river and opened the region for commercial development. Who were the founders of Shreveport? Seeing the potential for commercial profit in the area made possible by Captain Shreves work, some enterprising investors formed the Shreve Town
