The best source I've seen on sawyers and snags is Louis Hunter's Steamboats 
on the Western Rivers (1949), pp. 235-36. He describes exactly how and why 
they occur, the conditions and seasons when they were most dangerous, etc. 
The section of the river between St Louis and Cairo was known as "The 
Graveyard" because it averaged more than one wreck per mile, most caused by 
encounters with snags and sawyers. A sawyer, BTW, is a type of snag whose 
shaft points downstream and moves in an up and down "sawing" motion, visible 
one moment and invisible the next. They were equally dangerous to steamboats 
going upstream or down. The lower the water level in the river, the greater 
the hazard, even though they became more visible at those times.

Kevin
@
Mac Donnell Rare Books
9307 Glenlake Drive
Austin TX 78730
512-345-4139
Member: ABAA, ILAB
*************************
You may browse our books at:
www.macdonnellrarebooks.com


-----Original Message----- 
From: Martin Zehr
Sent: Tuesday, March 07, 2017 9:38 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Just wondering about Sawyers

And, to add to Kevin's insights, it would make sense that a sawyer might be
more of a nuisance to navigation on the Missouri River than the
Mississippi.  Heaving wood scraps into the river, or moving raw timber on
the river, in those pre-EPA days, would certainly have more impact on the
generally much narrower Missouri River than the Mississippi. The Missouri,
from its confluence with the Mississippi, going west and north, is
navigable at least as far as Omaha, but the steamboats Clemens piloted were
generally much larger than those on the Mississippi.  He was, however,
familiar with the Missouri, and when he absquatulated to the West with his
brother Orion, it was via the Missouri to St. Joseph, where they caught
their coach heading west across Kansas and the Nebraska territory.
MZ

On Tue, Mar 7, 2017 at 8:46 AM, Kevin Mac Donnell <
[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> I think it's a reasonable assumption, if not a given. I've talked about i=
t
> in one of my essays (I forget which one), pointing out that Tom, like a
> sawyer, pops up unpredictably and causes trouble each time. More than a
> mere
> annoyance, he represents a threat to Huck and Jim's navigation away from
> conformity.
>
> The earliest I can recall seeing the sawyer=3DSawyer connection being mad=
e is
> in William G. Barrett's `On the Naming of Tom Sawyer', Psychoanalytic
> Quarterly 24:3 (1955), but Barrett simply notes it as a possible source a=
nd
> then dives back into his absurd psycho-babble about how Tom got his name.
> His essay is worth reading as an example of how far out on a limb
> psychological theory can climb--I guess that's where the nuts are. But
> Barrett's nonsense was so silly that I once wondered if his article was a
> hoax intended to make fun of Freudian claptrap of the 1950s, when no ciga=
r
> was just a cigar. Barrett says Tom starts with T just like Twain, and
> Sawyer
> starts with S just like Sam. Hence, Sam Twain. and therefore Tom Sawyer.
> Voila! I'm not making this up, but Barrett uses jargon to explain it, so =
it
> must be true.
>
> And on the subject of Tom Sawyer's name, he was not named after a San
> Francisco fireman. Pure bunk. Smoke without the mirrors, and no fire
> either.
>
> However, my wonderful wonderful black cat, Felix, was indeed named after =
a
> more famous cat of the same name, and I was named after one of my
> grandfather's friends, Kevin Barry, who upset the English so much they
> hanged him. I hope nobody is upset by my musings on the naming of Tom
> Sawyer.
>
> Kevin
> @
> Mac Donnell Rare Books
> 9307 Glenlake Drive
> Austin TX 78730
> 512-345-4139
> Member: ABAA, ILAB
> *************************
> You may browse our books at:
> www.macdonnellrarebooks.com
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Scott Holmes
> Sent: Tuesday, March 07, 2017 1:44 AM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Just wondering about Sawyers
>
> I've been working on my Roughing It videos and lessons and came across
> discussions of sawyers as nuisances to navigation. =C3=82 In these instan=
ces
> they referred to the Missouri rather than the Mississippi. =C3=82 I was j=
ust
> thinking that the thought of them being nuisances might have inspired
> Twain to name his most popular nuisance Sawyer, Tom Sawyer.
>
> --
> There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of
>                           in your philosophy.
>                         http://bscottholmes.com
>