So it became known as “Shed Road.” This was a nine-mile covered roadway stretching from Red Chute in the east all the way to the Red River and was the first all-weather turnpike in the South. As more wagons traveled the main road, in 1870 it was decided to improve it by building a protective cover to keep wagons loaded with cotton from getting bogged down in Louisiana mud during the rains. Post-Civil War Progressĭuring Reconstruction in post-Civil War Louisiana, all areas west of the Mississippi attracted those seeking new lands or resources to exploit and Elysian Groves Plantation became the spot upon which all travel through the area converged. Steel rails wouldn’t reach Monroe from Vicksburg until 1861 and while construction began in Shreveport, it was soon to be abandoned and wasn’t picked up until after the war and completed until 1884. Then there was the Civil War in 1860 which previous construction and supply contracts for this northern Louisiana rail line were soon broken.
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There were also other impediments as Yellow Fever epidemics struck the countryside with some regularity after 1852. But progress on the East-West rail line was stymied due to flooding of the Mississippi river which inundated desired routes as well as prevention of the shipment of steel rails for construction. It was also a supply depot for emigrants headed westward to Texas by way of Cane’s Landing ferry which encouraged the development of a westward rail line.Ī railroad convention was held in Monroe in 1851 which extolled the virtues of a line across one of the “ finest and most productive regions of the South.” In 1853, the long-awaited Vicksburg-Shreveport and Texas Railroad company was officially organized at Monroe, Louisiana on January 24. By the 1850’s Shreveport had become an important cotton center with a population of 2,000. The idea of a railroad across northern Louisiana with visions of transcontinentalism was much desired. On April 28, 1853, they approved “An Act to incorporate the Vicksburg, Shreveport and Texas Railroad Company.” This legislation hoped for a new economic day for the northern section of the state and Act 178 pledged the state’s purchase of $800,000 worth of stock in the new company. The Louisiana Legislature of 1853 had a keen appreciation for internal improvements. A small settlement developed around the landing which was called “Cane City.” 1850 – 1861: Railroad Promises Made This natural transportation resource allowed ferry traffic across the Red River as well as riverboats to come and go, taking loads of local agricultural products like bales of cotton, bushels of corn and sweet potatoes downriver to be shipped back east. Do you know the history of Bossier railroads? 1830’s: The Early Beginnings of Bossierīack before there was a “Bossier City,” there was a place known as “Elysian Groves Plantation” which was the result of a partnership between William Bennett and James Cane who both co-owned a trading post overlooking the west side of the Red River known as “Cane’s-Bennett Bluff.” The trading post was one of the earliest commercial businesses in what was then known as “Shreve Town.” James Cane and wife Mary ran the Elysian Plantation household on the east side of the Red River and nearby there was a simple commercial ferry port designated as “Cane’s Landing,” another outgrowth of the Bennett-Cane partnership. Just as its recent growth has relied on developments of new technology, long ago Bossier City relied on its early growth from the new transportation economy both natural and man made.
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Either way, many names on a map today indicate places long-faded from history only to be trivial curiosities as to how such places came to be named with little or no evidence of ever having existed in the first place.įortunately though, Bossier City has not become one of those faded areas as it is a thriving community, being one of the fastest growing cities in the state. There are countless communities that have disappeared because they were bypassed or overlooked in favor of a better route be it from natural geographic advantages or political intrigue. Much of history has stories about once thriving communities that became ghost towns in a matter of years if not months, thanks to the detour of something vital like a waterway, roadway or railroad.
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Every town or community in the United States owes its existence to the development of transportation infrastructure.