The center of Charles Lindbergh's grand boyhood adventures was the Mississippi River. Here he fished and swam, built and 'sailed" a raft, skipped across logjams, and looked across the water's wide expanse, dreaming about the future. It was in this place that Lindbergh's wide-ranging appreciation for the natural world began taking shape.
The Mississippi River - how it has wound in and out through my life like the seasons! I grew up on its banks, swam through its rapids, portaged its headwaters with my father. From Montana to Alabama, from Wisconsin to Texas, I've barnstormed through its valley. Each flight on my mail route took me over its junction with the muddy Missouri. Now, the movement of the ocean waves below, extending on to the straight line of the horizon, reminds me of the river's wheatfields.
Charles A. Lindbergh
The Spirit of St. Louis
[Photo captions] Clockwise from far left:
Charles with his dog Spot, 1910;
Charles on his homemade raft on the Mississippi River, about 1912;
Charles and his father on a hunting trip near Little Falls, 1911
Top photo courtesy of the Lindbergh Picture Collection, Manuscripts and Archives, Yale University Library
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