Steam Boat Pioneer

Frontier Childhood.

Henry Shreve's father, Israel, served with distinction in the Revolutionary War, but it cost him dearly. The British destroyed his New Jersey farm, and his Quaker congregation drove him from the church community as punishment for taking up arms. In July 1788 Israel decided to take his family, including threeyear- old Henry, out to the western Pennsylvania frontier to start over again. In Fayette County, along the banks of the Monongahela and the Youghiogheny Rivers, young Henry grew up watching boatmen, among them his own brother John, sail off on trading expeditions down the Ohio and the Mississippi, and on to New Orleans or the West Indies, returning months later with tales of their adventures. The young Shreve heard these stories of far-off places and dreamed of following the river himself.

Professional Riverman.

At fourteen, after his father died, Henry...