New mural depicts riverboat commerce

It's been a few weeks since the last Mississippi River Tales mural was completed because the artists have taken some time off while waiting for new paint to arrive. But the mural depicting the height of riverboat commerce in the 1880s is nearly finished except for a few details.

This latest mural shows men unloading a riverboat docked at Cape Girardeau. According to main mural painter Thomas Melvin, the men in this mural who are hauling barrels and sacks are supposed to be roustabouts, who Melvin said were the longshoremen of the steamboat era.

These roustabouts are carrying grain off the riverboat -- grain that likely was destined for George Thilenius' flour mill on Broadway, Melvin said. In addition to Thilenius' mill, there were three other mills in Cape Girardeau circa 1880.

The wild geese and turkeys in the mural are about to be herded onto the riverboat to be shipped someplace for sale.

Melvin said this mural is a very broad overview of the riverboat's presence in Cape Girardeau, a presence that died out when the railroads came around the start of the new century.

-- Kathryn Alfisi