The Mississippi River played a significant part in the history of the United States, and a Lacombe area inventor helped developed the concept of steam-driven boats that made cargo transport on the river a reality. His early prototypes were designed at Oaklawn, one of the Lacombe area's most historic communities.
Historian Don Sharp feels strongly that the contributions of inventor James Rumsey should be recognized as a major factor in helping the United States become an economic and political force. Rumsey, who once served as George Washington's Chief Engineer, was widely-recognized for his outstanding work, along with dozens of inventions over his lifetime.
Prior to steamships being able to go upstream against the current, the only river trade possible was the shipping of products downstream from the Midwest to New Orleans. And since boats could not return to their homeports up north, much of that cargo was brought in on rafts. After unloading their cargo, the rafts were dismantled and much of New Orleans was built using lumber salvaged from those rafts.
But when steam propulsion of cargo ships became possible, cargo went both up and down the Mississippi. That achievement was the dreams of many inventors in the late 1700's, but James Rumsey of Lacombe demonstrated a successful method of steam propulsion on the Potomac River near Washington, D.C. It was the first time boat transport "against the current" was accomplished.
A few years earlier, Rumsey, a mechanical engineer, was working in his secret workshop off Bayou Lacombe, right across from the new Lacombe Nature Park north of Tammany Trace. Rumsey was designing a watercraft that could travel "against the current." And at the same time several men in Philadelphia were drafting a document, the Declaration of Independence, which would also go "against the current" of the existing government, which was an extension of the British monarchy on the other side of the Atlantic.
An exhibit at the Louisiana Maritime Museum in Madisonville
Rumsey's achievements helped solidify the new nation's ability to reach all up and down its rivers, spreading independence and freedom to all of its new citizens.
The American Revolution that began on July 4, 1776, was accompanied by the another revolution in water transportation that began with Rumsey's steam-engine powered watercraft.
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The reason why more people didn't know more about Rumsey's contributions to the revolution was that he, himself, was trying to keep it a secret. Based on the lack of a patent office to protect his invention, he had to keep many things secret, his background, his previous business failures, and his British connections.
In a recent interview, Sharp told how Rumsey's invention efforts were concurrent with the American Founding Fathers who were inventing a new form of government. He tells how the industrial revolution joined forces with the American Revolution, and a nation was born that the world had never seen before.
He hopes that some kind of historical marker will be placed in the Lacombe Nature Park or across the bayou at Rouville and Oaklawn streets to mark where Rumsey did his early work on his boat.
Sharp feels that the key role that Rumsey played in American history needs to be recognized locally as it is already recognized with a historical marker in Shepherdstown, West Virginia.
"Rumsey is so important," Sharp says." He started a revolution in water transportation, and he helped settle mid-America. He was a friend of Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin. He died in 1798."
A historical marker about the end of the American Revolution is already in place at the Madisonville town hall, where Capt. Shaw declared that "we are all Americans now."
