Cincinnati: The Levee at Daybreak c. 1884

Always a favorite subject because of its riverboat legacy and famous Suspension Bridge, the section of Cincinnati’s levee portrayed here is precisely where the Riverfront Stadium is located today. Usually jam-packed with steamboats, this section, just east of the north bridge pier, was known as the Public Landing, at the point where the levee extended a further block north, creating a substantial open area where the marketing and trans-shipment of the merchandise of river commerce took place.

In this view the lighthouse tender “Lily” is selected because of its smaller scale and more varied detail than most other boats of the period. She is seen tied up just below the wharf boat of the Louisville and Cincinnati Packet Co. loading up for a trip. The vessel was one of several tenders which plied the Ohio and Mississippi rivers putting up or servicing the busy rivers’ navigation lights. These were usually oil burning lamps which were monitored by local riverside farmers. Management of the navigation lights, first under the U.S. Light House Service, became the responsibility of the U.S. Coast Guard in 1939.

The principal landmark featured here is John Roebling’s famous Suspension Bridge, the precursor to his Brooklyn Bridge which was so considerably larger in scale. Constructed between 1856 and 1867, work was suspended during the Civil War. The bridge, somewhat modified in a reconstruction in 1898 to allow greater load capacity, still stands as a venerate monument to Cincinnati’s proud days of yore.

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