Stephanie Hanes
In today鈥檚 Daily, staff writer Harry Bruinius shares his latest dispatch from Route 66. He鈥檚 traveling that historic highway all summer, searching for stories that reveal an America we often miss in the day鈥檚 top headlines. Today, we鈥檙e sharing his piece from Illinois, along the banks of the muddy Mississippi River. It is a place, he writes, where the waterway is 鈥渘ot so much scenery as a force of nature.鈥 What he learns about this central corridor of commerce 鈥 this 鈥渉ighway before highways鈥 鈥 tells us a lot about ourselves. And it shows how a great economy can depend on a series of locks, generations of dam operators, and a diminishing flow of water.