Read about communities that have revitalized their waterfronts and
cleaned up their water pollution, creating America's Heritage Rivers
Fun Facts about Famous Rivers
The Nez Perce Indians called the Salmon River "Natsoh Koos," which
means
"Chinook Salmon Water". The 425-mile waterway is the longest completely free
flowing river in the lower 48 states and one of the few in the nation
that contains no dams. The river begins as not much more than a
trickle at an elevation of about 8,000 feet in the Sawtooth and
Whitecloud Mountains of central Idaho. It gathers force as it makes its
way northeast and then west, fed by snows from the Sawtooth and Salmon
River Mountains in the south and the Clearwater and Bitterroot Mountains
in the north. About 150 miles further on its westward course, the Salmon
River has created the second deepest canyon in North America, which
effectively splits Idaho in half. The section known as the Lower Salmon
River begins at Vinegar Creek, 25 miles above the town of Riggins. At
Riggins, the river swings north and then west for 87 miles then meets the
Snake
River. The Salmon and Snake combine to flow into the Columbia River and
eventually into the ocean. The drainage area of the Salmon River, which
lies entirely within Idahos borders, encompasses approximately 13,550
square miles.
You probably know that at 3,716 miles, the
Mississippi river is the longest in America. But did you
know that the Volga, at 2,762 miles
is the longest in Europe? Or that the longest river in Asia, at
3,314
miles is the Yang-tze-Kiang? And the
2,578 miles Nile is the longest river in Africa.
The Yukon River was the main route to the gold fields of the
Klondike. During the last great gold rush, thousands of prospectors
stampeded north to Canada's Yukon Territory with the dream of striking it
rich. The Yukon has lured prospectors and adventurers ever since. In
his book Yukon River: An Adventure to the Goldfields of the Klondike, Peter
Lourie takes young readers on an exciting 460-mile canoe trip down the
fourth-largest river in North America. He follows the rugged trail of the
gold miners from Whitehorse, the capital of the Yukon Territory, to the
miners' final destination at Dawson, a gold-rush boomtown near the
Arctic Circle. On his journey, he discovers abandoned outposts of the
Northwest Mounted Police and eerie ruins of old paddle wheelers. He
crosses mysterious Lake Laberge and plunges through fierce Five Finger
Rapids. Finally, he meets a prospector who digs for gold in the hills
above Dawson as if it were still 1898.
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