Located in Cairo for nearly seventy years, the Barrett Line played an important role in the history of that city - a history no chapter can be written withouth the rivers having a prominent place in the story. There is hardly any other single industry in Cairo of the size and importance of the Barrett Line that has been operated continuously here for so long a time. Dating back as a contemporary with the Anchor Line, the Lee Line, and other large and small packet and towboat companies of the days when romance was in full flower of steamboating on the rivers, the Barrett Line is one of the few that remains in operation today. Always in the towing business, a less spectacular and picturesque activity than was the operation of the packet boats with their singing and hustling negro roustabouts and rough speaking and rougher acting mates, their venturing and pioneering passengers, the Barrett Line handled greater volumes of freight than did those old packet lines whose histories are told in song and story. The Barrett Line was pushing large tows up and down the rivers not long after that seemingly ancient time - 1870 - when the Robert E. Lee and the Natchez were running their immortal race from New Orleans to St. Louis. It has operated as many as eight towboats at one time, and during most of its life it has operated half that number or more. Fleets of barges in large number have been used with these towboats. At first it was the old strongly built wooden barges and wooden steamboats. Now all the barges and boats are constructed of steel. In all this business of river transportation the Barrett Line used an assortment of craft such as derrick boats and quarter boats, for loading and unloading logs, rocks, and other material it transported and furnishing living quarters for workmen. Most of the bricks that went into the streets of Cairo were towed down the Ohio by the Barrett Line from the kiln at Portsmouth, Ohio. Much of the stone with which the river banks at Cairo are revetted for protection against scour were transported by the Barrett Line from its quarries on the Cumberland or those at Neely's Landing on the Mississippi River. Far up and down the rivers are many stretches of revetment made of stone hauled by the Barrett Line. And much of the material in some of the massive dams, their large bases and submerged depths was towed in Barrett Line barges by Barrett Line boats. About a quarter of a century ago this company was pushing huge tows of logs into Cairo from the nearby plentiful forests. However, the Barrett Line is widening the variety of its transportation. WIth less logs and stone to transport there is still plenty of coal to be moved a great volume of which business it has had in the past, many coal mines having been owned and operated by the Barrett family in Cincinnati. In recent years a heavy volume of oil towing business has come, also the increased transportation of iron and steel, iron and steel products, and every kind of merchandise, heavy and light. Of late, the Barrett Line has chartered many of its boats for such towing to other companies. This business is growing and will continue to grow. The Barrett Line not only survived but grew strong during the ear of lean days on the rivers. The tonnage hauled in the hey day of steamboating was nothing compared to the enormous volumes of freight now moved in a less prosaic but more efficient manner.q