Ferries

East Dubuque Local Area History Project

	by S.K. 5/2/00

	The upper Mississippi relied on ferries to cross the river before there were bridges. The first ferries were primitive. Mathias Ham’s and Eagle Point Ferry were nothing more than a canoe.

	Thomas Jordan built a cabin in what is now called East Dubuque in the 1830’s. Jordan operated a ferry which consisted of two canoes hooked together to get across the Mississippi. It was used by traders and miners. The west side of the river would have been Indian territory at that time. There was no town, but the location was called Jordan’s ferry. Thomas Jordan died in 1810.

	In 1837, Iowa’s first ferry began operation. This was a horse ferry. It had a team of horses in the middle on a treadmill which moved the paddles. That ferry crashed into a steamer and sank.

	In 1838, George Wallace Jones began operating a ferry from the Sinsinawa Mound area on Th. eastern side of the river. The fare was 25 cents. This ferry was very successful. It made about $25,000 dollars a year. In 1840 George Wallace Jones was given permission to operate an oar ferry from Dubuque.

	In 1838 the Iowa Territory granted Timothy Fanning exclusive rights to operate a Dubuque Ferry for 25 years. He had to be able to land anywhere on Dubuque’s waterfront. By 1840, Fanning had a steam powered ferry. In 1855, he added another large steam ferry, the Queen City, to serve the Wisconsin shore area.

	In 1852 Charles Gregoire got rights to operate a ferry from the Dubuque city council. His license and Fanning’s overlapped, and Fanning sued. The case went to the U.S. Supreme Court and Fanning lost. Gregoire’s steam ferry, Utah, began operation in 1852.

	In 1854 the number of wagons that crossed the Mississippi is 4,300, carriages 3,100, horses 8,010, cattle 9,518, sheep were 2,708, and hogs were 6,630. One year after wagons were 10,700, carriages 4,200, horses were 12,110, cattle 14,210, sheep 4,680, and hogs were 16,134.

	In 1856 railroads came to East Dubuque. Then ferries still delivered mail, they took it from the trains and brought it across the river. Then tracks were laid on the Dubuque side of the river. Before long, bridges took place of ferries.

	Bibliography Randolph W. Lyon. Dubuque: The Encyclopedia. Dubuque, Iowa: Union-Hoermann Press, 1991. Chandler C Childs. Dubuque: Frontier River City. Dubuque, Iowa Research Center for Dubuque Area History Loras Collage, 1984. Photo Courtesy of Center for Dubuque History. Loras College, Dubuque, Iowa.