Charles Edward Russell

An entertaining account of the golden era of lumber rafting, back in print! During the nineteenth century, pine logs were lashed together to form easily floatable rafts that traveled from Minnesota and Wisconsin down the Mississippi River to build the farms and towns of the virtually treeless lower Midwest. These huge log rafts were steered down the river by steamboat pilots whose skill and intimate knowledge of the river’s many hazards were legendary. Charles Edward Russell, a Pulitzer Prize-winning author, chronicles the history and river lore of seventy years of lumber rafting. "Russell deals with those decades during which the lumber business and the rafting of lumber grew and reached enormous proportions. But his story covers also the splendid phase of the river steamboat. Russell writes with a lively pen, and he has made a colorful and entertaining account." New York Times Book Review"Not a dull page in the book. Russell writes frontier history as it should be written." New York Herald TribuneFesler-Lampert Minnesota Heritage Series

"Meantime you and I, we pay the extortionate rates in everything we buy, and meantime these same extortionate rates pile up to make the fortunes that are produced from an investment of nothing." -Charles Edward Russell, Stories of the Great Railroads (1912) Stories of the Great Railroads (1912) by Charles Edward Russell is a collection of articles, most of which originally appeared in Hampton's Magazine prior to the book's publication. Russell documents the corruption in the railway industry from finances and mismanagement to monopolies and worker safety. Russell's journalistic revelation led railroad executives to claim that Russell was publishing lies. They went on to use their power to lead Hampton's Magazine to ruin. A primary source that digs deep into history and duplicity, this book is for those interested in learning more about the muckraking era.