Steamboats on Louisiana's Bayous: A History and Directory fills a gargantuan void in the economic and social history of Louisiana. As the authors state in the preface: “Yet the steamboats of the Bayou Country were not sumptuously appointed pleasure craft. Instead they were—like tugboats and barges that succeeded them—working vessels of utilitarian design and sturdy construction, employed in the mundane business of transporting bulk cargoes to market” (pp. ix–x). As a state heavily dependent upon its agricultural produce of cotton, sugar, and rice, Louisiana reached its markets through steamboat transportation. Equally dependent upon imports for the bayou country's survival, the state's residents used steamboats to provide the necessities of life. Isolated and distant from New Orleans and the Mississippi corridor, the bayou country utilized steamboats plying the dangerous and treacherous small bayous to bring civilization through mail, passengers, and floating entertainment. “The Atchafalaya River, for example, extends 145 miles from its source to the Gulf, achieving the ‘same distance that the Mississippi River takes 322 miles to span’” (p. 21). Agreeing with the authors, Charles Robert Goins and John Michael Caldwell state, “Of whatever variety, steamboats represented in their time the means of choice insofar as transportation was concerned” (Historical Atlas of Louisiana. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1995, p. 72).

As Joe Gray Taylor in The Rivers and Bayous of Louisiana (Edwin Adam Davis ed. Baton Rouge: Louisiana Education Research Association, 1968, p. 7) has pointed out, “The rapid transportation provided by the steamboat contributed much to the prosperity of the villages and plantations of Louisiana.” In addition to their commercial value, steamboats were welcomed in the bayou country as an early form of nineteenthcentury entertainment. The most exciting aspects of antebellum steamers were the trials and tribulations, excitement and dangers of travelers. Not as opulent as the Mississippi River steamboats, those on Louisiana's bayous carried a cosmopolitan group of passengers who survived generally crowded accommodations with a “fare … that was at best forgettable” (p. 56). The ordinary food was more than made up by alcohol consumption. Drinking and gambling occupied the traveler's time on what must have been a long and often boring voyage.

Steam vessels met dangerous, threatening conditions on Louisiana's bayous including fluctuating water levels, sand bars, logjams, snags, and other navigational hazards. By the 1850s boats and cargos, which were usually uninsured, routinely sank, representing large losses to their owners. At the same time, the steamers were faced with a new transportation competitor—the railroad. As rail lines snaked into the bayou country, the carrying trade of steamboats declined. The New Orleans, Opelousas, and Great Western Railroad and its successors provided direct connections between New Orleans and Houston by 1881. Distressed steamboat captains turned to operations as showboats and tugboats, which temporarily halted the decline in numbers of steamers. Nothing, however, could stem the demise of the steamboat. Roads and trucking would further negatively impact the commercial importance of the steamboat.

Brasseaux and Fontenot's use of primary documents, especially local newspapers, court records, federal government documents, and police jury proceedings, lends credence to their study. From these and other sources the authors glean the failures as well as successes of the steamboat era. They take a potentially dull topic and transform it into an exciting, fascinating story of steam navigation on Louisiana's bayous. Not only is their monograph important for the economic history of steamboats, but also for geographic, genealogical, and historic studies of the bayou country. The directory of some 500 steamboats, keelboats, and barges operating in the bayou country is a tremendous source of information for a myriad of future scholars.

The only serious flaw in an otherwise outstanding contribution to the historiography of steamboating is the total lack of maps. Even to a native Louisianan, the intricate maze of bayous including Courtableau, Teche, Lafourche, and the Vermilion and Atchafalaya rivers is difficult to comprehend. To the general reader confusion would abound. Otherwise, Brasseaux and Fontenot have provided an important study of steam transportation on Louisiana bayous.