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1955 Map of Wickliffe

Name: 1955 Topographic Map of Wickliffe
Creator: U.S. Geological Survey
Published: 1955
License: https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

USGS Topo · Published 1955

About this map

The confluence of the Ohio River and Mississippi River dominates this mid-century survey, illustrating a landscape defined by shifting water and river commerce. This crucial junction, where the waters meet near Cairo, Illinois, and Wickliffe, Kentucky, is marked by a complex system of river engineering including the Bend Revetment and a series of landings such as Norfolk Ldg and Pritchard Ldg. The terrain is a mosaic of islands and backwaters like Cane Island and Flat Pond, showing how the river's movement shaped local geography and travel during the era of flood control expansion.

Local life in the mid-1950s is deeply rooted in the rural corners of Ballard County and across the river in Mississippi County. The map reveals a dense network of small community hubs, evidenced by shared facilities like the Lower Crosno Ch & Sch and North Ballard Ch & Cem. For genealogists, these specific church-school-cemetery clusters, along with unique landmarks like Thirty Four Corner Sch, provide precise coordinates for family homesteads and vanished social centers of the tri-state river valley.