The Ohio River

Map of Ohio River Valley (within broader map of Eastern United States).

Library of Congress, Geography and Map Division

Quick Facts

Location:

Virginia Point Park

Significance:

Meriwether Lewis traveled this stretch of the Ohio River on his journey west in 1803.

Designation:

Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail

MANAGED BY:

Virginia Point Park, managed by the City of Kenova, WV. At the confluence of the Big Sandy and Ohio Rivers. Point where West Virginia, Kentucky, and Ohio meet.

Amenities

8 listed

Boat Ramp, Information Kiosk/Bulletin Board, Parking - Auto, Parking - Boat Trailer, Parking - Bus/RV, Picnic Shelter/Pavilion, Primitive Campsites, Toilet - Vault/Composting

Lewis and Clark NHT Visitor Centers and Museums

Visitor Centers (shown in orange), High Potential Historic Sites (shown in black), and Pivotal Places (shown in green) along the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail

In 1803, Meriwether Lewis paid a guide to get the boats and crew from Pittsburgh to the Falls of the Ohio River.  

The Ohio River was a busy highway. Indigenous residents of the valley, including Delaware, Shawnee, Haudenosaunee, and other people who had come to the valley as refugees lived in the Ohio River Valley in the late 1700s. Shawnee communities were known for accepting refugees from other Indigenous communities and their careful diplomacy helped foster pan-Indigenous confederacies out of the valley in the late 1700s.  

French traders frequented the Ohio in the seventeenth century, and by the early 1800s, many people in the valley had mixed Indigenous-French heritage.  

Following the American Revolution, a huge influx of White, American settlers came to the region, thanks to state and federal policies promoting settlement on lands violently seized from Indigenous people. Thousands of American settlers tookroads through Kentucky or floated down the Ohio on flatboats to claim these lands. Lewis passed several American settlements in 1803, and at one point, bought corn and potatoes from an American farmer. 

The water was low, which delayed their journey. To keep moving, they rowed, used poles to push the boat downstream, and at one point, “cut a channel through the gravel with our spade and canoe paddles and then drag the boat through.” These were all techniques that the many people who navigated the Ohio’s busy waters had likely used before.  

About this article: This article is part of a series called “Pivotal Places: Stories from the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail.”