The President: Last of the Sidewheelers

The steamboat President was built in nineteen twenty-four as the Cincinnati, one of the last overnight packet boats running between Louisville and Cincinnati. She was a true Western Rivers sidewheeler, a type of vessel that once defined American river travel. In nineteen twenty-nine Streckfus Steamers bought her, gutted the staterooms, and created a two-deck ballroom with a dance floor large enough for three thousand people.

For decades she cruised the Mississippi from St. Louis and New Orleans as one of the grandest excursion boats in America. In nineteen eighty-nine the National Park Service named her a National Historic Landmark, the last of her kind afloat.

Two years later she became one of the first modern riverboat casinos, docked in Davenport, Iowa. The designation was pulled in two thousand eleven after she lost too much of her historic character. Decommissioned in nineteen ninety-nine, dismantled in two thousand nine, pieces of the President now rest in a field near St.

Elmo, Illinois.