Record lows reveal magic of Mississippi River's sunken past

The Mississippi River has hit historic lows during a period of intense drought. It’s impacting barge traffic, threatening drinking water downriver and creating a dire situation for farmers throughout the basin.

It’s also revealing the river’s sunken past.

Century-old artifacts are surfacing, and some natural landmarks are visible for the first time in decades. People are flocking to the river to see for themselves before the water rises and buries it again.

Heyday for relic hunters

Riley Bryant has made relic hunting his full-time job. He works for American Digger Magazine as well as History Seekers, a company that sells metal detectors. He makes some extra money from TikTok, where he’s known as “Relic Riley.”

His obsession started around 11 years old, when he got his first metal detector. Now, at 21 years old, his hundreds of thousands of followers reflect people’s fascination with hidden relics — even before his videos of the low river took off.

The gauge in Memphis recorded a historic low in October, and Bryant is a lifelong Memphian. The last time the river approached the record was 2012, the same year Bryant got his first metal detector, so this is his first time exploring the river at low levels.

Walking the banks in late October, Bryant spotted a Civil War-era cartridge box plate — a metal plate attached to the box soldiers used to carry ammunition — perched on top of a rock, so he posted a video on TikTok.

His discoveries have been popular, which surprised Bryant. More than four million people watched his video about the box plate, and millions more have tuned in to his other videos.

This type of object is not rare in the river by any means, but it's exciting to people unfamiliar with the world of relic hunting.

The discovery of the box plate was not shocking to Bryant; he was more taken aback by the general lack of awareness that traffic along the waterway during the Civil War has made relics from the era commonplace.

Widespread finds

Tower Rock in Missouri is a 400-million-year-old limestone formation that is only visible in low water. People walked across the newly exposed sandbar to see the landmark up close and — to the frustration of the Missouri Department of Conservation — climbed the rock.

The landmark drew so many people to the island near Wittenberg, Missouri, that traffic overwhelmed the two-lane roads, and the Missouri Department of Conservation issued a safety reminder for visitors.

Downriver, the discovery of the sunken Brookhill Ferry in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, spurred a cascade of news coverage when a passerby spotted a century-old wooden boat in early October. The discovery got the attention of Louisiana state archaeologist Chip McGimsey.

The state recognized the ferry as an archaeological site in the early 1990s, although not much of it was exposed at the time. Now, McGimsey and others are trying to document the ferry — particularly the materials and techniques used to construct it — before the water rises again. It’s an opportunity to learn more about shipbuilding during that era.

As an archaeologist, McGimsey said it’s a fascinating find, but the widespread interest caught him by surprise. The ferry is not that historically significant in a big-picture sense, he said, but by late October, there were more than 1,300 stories about it online.

Why do so many people care about the Brookhill Ferry?

“I don’t have a clue,” McGimsey said. “To me, this is the most absurd thing I’ve ever been involved in.”

The ferry was one of the first big finds during this low period, so McGimsey speculated that the initial photos provided a visual example of drought on the river, which captured public interest.

The low water is also a rare experience for most people, he said.

“Most of us sort of live in our little world where everything is always the same,” he said. “The leaves change, and the grass grows, but when a river drops like this … there’s a real sense of discovery — a sort of magic.”

An increasingly common experience

But what may have been a once-in-a-generation occurrence is expected to become more common.

The federal drought monitor shows that about 85% of the country is experiencing some level of drought, and climate models predict that drought and flooding are becoming more frequent and more severe.

Just last week, a coalition of Mississippi River mayors pushed for federal support during future droughts, including the option for federal disaster declarations and the ability to use Federal Emergency Management Assistance dollars.

Current climate projections predict drought will become more frequent and continue to impact shipping, tourism, agriculture and politics.

But for archaeologists — amateur and professional — low water levels could unveil a trove of previously unknown artifacts, and with an ever-changing riverbed, the next drought could reveal a very different landscape.

This story is a product of the Mississippi River Basin Ag & Water Desk, an editorially independent reporting network based at the University of Missouri School of Journalism in partnership with Report For America and the Society of Environmental Journalists, funded by the Walton Family Foundation.