Stories of Interest from the Hickman Courier from March 16, 1872 A body of a man was found in the Mississippi River above the Hickman wharf on March 11th. No identification was found on the body but was believed to be a steamboat deckhand or laborer. An inquest found it to be an accidental drowning. The corpse was buried in the city cemetery. The rock for building the Hickman wharf began to arrive by rail on March 13th from Johnsonville, Tennessee. Contractors planned to fill in as much rock as possible before the spring floods. City leaders encouraged residents to plant shade…

Stories of Interest from the Hickman Courier from March 9, 1872 The driving of piles at the Hickman wharf was fully underway. The piles were made of cypress logs, thirty, forty, fifty and sixty feet in length and an average of ten inches thick. 400 piles were needed to be driven before completion of the project. A freight blockade at Hickman continued as railroad cars backed up in the railyard. The yard managers claim it was “now absolutely compulsory on them to erect an elevator.” Building sites in East Hickman were offered to “bona fide settlers.” Every fourth lot in the division…