Joanne Richardson

Signs at Lake Calhoun have been changed to include the lake's Dakota name, Bde Maka Ska. The new signs were approved by the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board. The signs updated on Oct. 2, 2015. Peter Cox | MPR News

The PulseDecember 14, 2015

How to say Lake Calhoun’s Dakota name: ‘Bdé Makhá Ská’

By Britta Green

Across all of North America, a rich array of indigenous nations and communities inhabited the landscape before Europeans came. Many places retain traces of these older cultures in their place-names; others show the impacts of continuing inhabitation by indigenous people through efforts to re-name features of the landscape with the language the land once knew. Bdé Makhá Ská, a lake in Minneapolis that formerly held the name of a 19th century defender of slavery, is but one example of this emerging trend. Bdé Makhá Ská is located just 5 miles west of the Mississippi River, a feature that is itself named in a derivation from indigenous terms.

MPR News

The PulseDecember 14, 2015

At What Point Do We Protect Rivers?

By Meghan Boian

One of the biggest policy debates currently involving rivers is over the proposed federal Clean Water Rule. As this blog from American Rivers explains, the Clean Water Rule clarifies which waters in the United States are protected by the Clean Water Act. The Clean Water Act, the federal government’s primary regulatory tool against water pollution, stipulates which waters should be monitored and improved with the goal of becoming fishable, swimmable, and drinkable. The proposed Clean Water Rule draws on extensive review of scientific literature to clarify the ultimate connectivity of major rivers to other sources of surface and ground water.

American Rivers

North America Planning / Policy Policy

University of Minnesota campus and the Mississippi River. Image courtesy of University of Minnesota.

Teaching and PracticeDecember 11, 2015

Teaching About Rivers

By Patrick Nunnally Teaching about rivers is complicated. Higher education has for the past century and a half, or longer, been divided into academic disciplines…

Engagement Planning / Policy Upper Mississippi River

University of Minnesota on the Mississippi River looking towards St. Anthony Falls. Image from the Metropolitan Design Center Image Bank. Copyright Regents of the University of Minnesota. All rights reserved. Used with permission.

IntroductionDecember 11, 2015

Introduction to Issue One

By Patrick Nunnally, Editor Welcome to the Inaugural issue of Open Rivers: Rethinking the Mississippi! What is there to say about the Mississippi River…

PerspectivesDecember 11, 2015

The New Madrid Levee: A New Take on an Enduring Conflict

By Olivia Dorothy, Patrick Nunnally Open Rivers contacted Olivia Dorothy [OD], Associate Director for Mississippi River management at American Rivers. American Rivers is a…

Lower Mississippi River Planning / Policy Policy

"No Place Like Home": Remembering the Bohemian Flats, Panel One from "Bohemian Flats: One Place, Many Voices,” exhibited at Mill City Museum, Minneapolis, April 30 through November 1, 2015. Image courtesy of Minnesota Historical Society.

In ReviewDecember 11, 2015

“Remembering the Bohemian Flats”: An Exhibit and a Practice of Public Memory

By Laurie Moberg “Remembering the Bohemian Flats: One Place, Many Voices,” exhibited at Mill City Museum, Minneapolis, April 30 through November 1, 2015. From…

Anthropology Engagement Upper Mississippi River

River Life's River Atlas showing the mussel collection.

GeographiesDecember 11, 2015

Mussels: A River Life Atlas Collection

By Joanne Richardson One of the key components of people’s sense of self is a sense of place, which becomes a meaningful precursor for knowing…

Science Upper Mississippi River

Primary SourcesDecember 11, 2015

An Enchanted Landscape: Remembering Historic Swede Hollow

By Stefanie Kowalczyk Tucked away in a glacially carved ravine along Phalen Creek, a tributary of the Mississippi River, just a stone’s throw from the…

Engagement History Upper Mississippi River

Aerial view of the Hernando de Soto Bridge across the Mississippi River between Memphis, Tennessee and West Memphis, Arkansas, USA. The bridge was opened in 1973 and carries six lanes of Interstate 40 across the river. View is from the Arkansas side to the east-southeast across the river to Memphis. Photographer Larry Donald, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.

FeatureDecember 10, 2015

Knowing the Mississippi

We asked a diverse group of river people to respond to the prompt “How did you come to know the Mississippi River? What does it mean, to you, to know the Mississippi River?” We present below a few of the responses, in no particular order.

Arts History International Legal Literature Mississippi River Basin North America

Mississippi River from overlook on campground road, Great River Bluffs State Park, Minnesota, USA. Photographer McGhiever. Used under Creative Commons license CC BY-SA.

FeatureDecember 10, 2015

Knowing the Mississippi

We asked a diverse group of river people to respond to the prompt “How did you come to know the Mississippi River? What does it mean, to you, to know the Mississippi River?” We present below a few of the responses, in no particular order.

History Legal Lower Mississippi River North America Planning / Policy Upper Mississippi River