May 25, 1971

President Richard Nixon traveled to Mobile to symbolically start construction of the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway. Commonly known as the Tenn-Tom, the 234-mile waterway connects the Tennessee and Tombigbee rivers, allowing commercial navigation from the nation’s midsection to the Gulf of Mexico. Construction of the Tenn-Tom required the excavation of 310 million cubic yards of earth, more than the Panama Canal, and took 12 years to complete. The waterway is administered by the Army Corps of Engineers and encompasses 17 public ports and terminals, 110,000 acres of land, and another 88,000 acres managed by state conservation agencies for preservation and recreational use.

Read more at Encyclopedia of Alabama.

President Richard Nixon, 12-21-1970. (The U.S. National Archives at College Park, research.archives.gov/description/1634221)

A map showing the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway (red dotted line), connecting the Tennessee and Tombigbee rivers along the Alabama-Mississippi border. (From Encyclopedia of Alabama, Courtesy of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers)

Lawmakers and military generals pose to celebrate the day Congress approved plans for the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway in 1946. Standing, from left: Alabama Rep. Frank Boykin, Gen. Eugene Reybold, Gen. Crawford, Gen. James Mollison, Mississippi Rep. John Elliott Rankin, and seated, Texas Rep. Joseph Jefferson Mansfield. (From Encyclopedia of Alabama, Courtesy of the Alabama Department of Archives and History)

Recreational boats are seen lined up in a lock on the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway. (From Encyclopedia of Alabama, Courtesy of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers)

For more on Alabama’s Bicentennial, visit Alabama 200.