TULSA, Okla. — Oklahoma is often depicted as oil and cowboy country, but few people know it is also host to one of the largest inland international seaports in the United States.
The Port of Catoosa, located in a 2,000-acre Tulsa industrial park, ships more than 2 million tons of cargo annually on barges that run the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System to the Mighty Mississippi.
Inbound shipments include oil drilling equipment, steel, wire, pipe and other materials used by the more than 50 companies located in the park.
Outbound shipments are mostly agricultural products - mainly wheat, soybeans and liquid fertilizer - for use in overseas markets.
Catoosa is the farthest inland seaport in the country, but it is not the only one in Oklahoma. Several miles down the Arkansas River is the Port of Muskogee.
Locks and dams help carry the barges along the shallow sections of the Arkansas before it joins the Mississippi River at Montgomery Point, 600 miles north of New Orleans.
The navigational system establishing the ports of Catoosa and Muskogee – as well as those at Pine Bluff and Little Rock, Ark. – was created by the political clout of the late Democratic U.S. Sen. John L. McClellan of Arkansas and Gov. Robert S. Kerr of Oklahoma in the mid 1940s. Both saw the need to control the unruly Arkansas River and the potential for its commercial use.
Five years into the early construction phase, President Eisenhower tightened the purse strings. But he was convinced by Republican Rep. Page Belcher that a reduction in federal funding could mean the loss of his Oklahoma Congressional seat to a Democrat. Eisenhower made sure the full funds stayed in the White House budget.
Today, the ports of Catoosa and Muskogee are vital to the Oklahoma economy. They provide direct employment for 4,000 people, with an annual payroll of more than $85 million. Indirect jobs account for another 6,000 positions and an additional $90 million in wages.
The ports are designated Foreign Trade Zones, making it possible for builders of drilling rigs and equipment for refining oil to fabricate and ship assembled products directly to destinations such as the North Sea and the Persian Gulf.
Shipments take longer via barge, but the savings is substantial. Navigation from the Port of Catoosa to New Orleans averages 10 days. The extra time is money saved. One barge has the capacity of 15 rail cars or 60 tractor-trailer trucks and uses less fuel.
One of the biggest concerns in developing the navigation system was an engineering problem common to every river and stream – the buildup of sediment or silt. Without constant dredging, the natural flow of water down the Arkansas River carries 100 million tons of silt annually, eventually accumulating to the point of preventing navigation.
A study by Professor Hans Albert Einstein, son of another famous scientist Einstein, theorized that a system could be designed to make the Arkansas “self-cleaning,” reducing the flow of silt. The study proposed that major reaches of the river should be deepened, straightened and narrowed to stabilize the banks and make the water flow faster, flushing out the sediment that otherwise would build up.
Experiments confirmed the theory. The self-cleaning worked so well that $31 million earmarked for sediment-trapping upstream dams was cut from the project’s cost.
Then the physical labor began. Workers moved in to start redefining river banks, building locks and dams and port facilities from the Mississippi River to Tulsa. Millions of tons of earth were moved. Millions of tons of concrete and steel went into the structures along the waterway.
When the project was finally completed in 1971, President Richard Nixon flew to Tulsa to deliver the keynote dedication address.
The cost of building the McClellan-Kerr Navigation System ended up at $1.3 billion. In 2005, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers reported a 99 percent return on investment.
And the payoff continues. Plans were recently announced for a new $50 million biodiesel plant in Muskogee.

Rick Lepper is the Web editor of the Muskogee, Okla., Phoenix.