Fifteen dams impound the main stem of the river, with hundreds more on tributaries. Conflict between settlers and Native Americans in the watershed led to some of the most longstanding and violent of the American Indian Wars.ĭuring the 20th century, the Missouri River basin was extensively developed for irrigation, flood control, and the generation of hydroelectric power. Pioneers headed west en masse beginning in the 1830s, first by covered wagon, then by the growing numbers of steamboats that entered service on the river. The growth of the fur trade in the early 19th century laid much of the groundwork as trappers explored the region and blazed trails. The Missouri River was one of the main routes for the westward expansion of the United States during the 19th century. The first Europeans encountered the river in the late seventeenth century, and the region passed through Spanish and French hands before becoming part of the United States through the Louisiana Purchase. More than ten major groups of Native Americans populated the watershed, most leading a nomadic lifestyle and dependent on enormous bison herds that roamed through the Great Plains. įor over 12,000 years, people have depended on the Missouri River and its tributaries as a source of sustenance and transportation. When combined with the lower Mississippi River, it forms the world's fourth longest river system. Although nominally considered a tributary of the Mississippi, the Missouri River above the confluence is much longer and carries a comparable volume of water. The river drains a sparsely populated, semi-arid watershed of more than 500,000 square miles (1,300,000 km 2), which includes parts of ten U.S. Rising in the Rocky Mountains of the Eastern Centennial Mountains of Southwestern Montana, the Missouri flows east and south for 2,341 miles (3,767 km) before entering the Mississippi River north of St. The Missouri River is the longest river in North America. Great Falls, MT, Bismarck, ND, Pierre, SD, Sioux City, IA, Omaha, NE, Brownville, NE, Saint Joseph, MO, Kansas City, KS, Kansas City, MO, St.
Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri The Missouri tribe, whose name in turn meant "people with wooden canoes" Map of the Missouri River and its tributaries in
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