Obion River/Hale's Point, Tennessee/Needham Cutoff

Obion River/Hale's Point, Tennessee/Needham Cutoff. Mississippi River Walk. , A) Obion River , Mile 819.2 AHP, Davy Crocket, famed pioneer and hero of the Alamo, was one of the early settlers along the Obion, and local legend holds that he killed 105 bears on its banks. The river was choked with snags and driftwood early in the 1800s. As the rich farmland of the area was settled, the river was made more passable, and flatboats began to move down it to Hale's Point. The Obion's upper reaches were found to be especially good for tobacco farming. Eventually, small steamboats could navigate the stream, and two small steamers ran between Dyersburg and Hale's Point as late at 1870. Railroad lines soon crisscrossed West Tennessee, and traffic on the Obion ceased., B) Hale's Point, Tennessee , Mile 819.3 AHP, The village of Hale's Point was a busy transfer point in the steamboat days. Flatboats and keelboats came down the Obion River and unloaded their cotton and tobacco at Hale's Point, where it was picked up by steamers headed down the Mississippi for New Orleans. , C) Needham Cutoff , Mile 821.1 AHP, In the spring of 1821, the river cut through the land of a farmer named Needham to form this channel. The Obion River had previously emptied into the Mississippi on the bend that was bypassed by Needham Cutoff. The Obion re-routed through the abandoned Mississippi river bed, taking a new mouth at the south end of the cutoff.