Brilliant Corners

The course of the Mississippi river

This “strange map” of the courses of the Mississippi river was the impetus for redesigning my weblog (for the 50th time). I wanted to start posting illustrations, art, photos, or whatever I come across that inspires me in some way. I can’t recall if this map appears in any of Edward Tufte’s books, but it certainly belongs in one if it’s not.

Here is a little more information about the map, from the site I linked to:

When looking at this map and seeing the jumble of ancient riverbeds - imagine all those shifts sped up: the Mississippi is like a shifting snake, twisting to find its easiest way down to the Gulf. These shifts occur every thousand years or so, especially in the lower parts of the river, through a process known as delta switching, or avulsion: when the river flow is slow, the sedimentation clogs the river channel and it eventually finds another channel. This process is by no means ‘historic’ (i.e. ‘over’) – from the 1950s onwards, the US government has worked on the Old River Control Structure, meant to prevent the Mississippi from switching to the Atchafalaya River channel.