Turning 55! The Tulsa Port of Catoosa.
It was January 21, 1971 when the first barge arrived at the port.
As leadership of the Port celebrate the anniversary this week, it said the 1971 barge arrival “marked a historic turning point for Oklahoma’s economy and global connectivity.”
On January 21, 1971, a barge carrying newsprint from Tennessee completed the first commercial trip along the water corridor from the Mississippi River to Catoosa. On February 20 the Tulsa Port of Catoosa officially opened for business. In June Pres. Richard M. Nixon formally dedicated the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System (MKARNS), according to the Oklahoma Historical Society.
What began as a bold vision has grown into one of the most impactful inland ports in the nation, according to the Port in a recent announcement.
Over the past 55 years, more than 50,000 barges have passed through the Port, moving goods, supporting industries, and helping businesses thrive across Oklahoma and beyond. The Port has played a vital role in strengthening supply chains, creating jobs, and positioning our state as a key player in national and international trade.
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The Tulsa Port of Catoosa is the head of navigation of the McClellan-Kerr Arkansas River Navigation System, a 445-mile waterway that links the Verdigris and Arkansas Rivers, the Arkansas Post Canal, the White River, and the Mississippi River. The waterway provides a nine-foot-deep channel with a total lift of 420 feet through eighteen locks and dams, thirteen in Arkansas and five in Oklahoma. Each lock chamber is 110 feet wide and 600 feet long.
Tulsa emerged as a port city in the early 1960s when twenty-three business people traveled from Tulsa to examine the Ohio River Valley navigation systems to evaluate their effect on industrial growth. The delegates convinced Tulsa business leaders that a port would stimulate business. Metropolitan Tulsa Chamber of Commerce leaders and asked Early Cass, of the water resources committee, to chair a port authority committee. On January 21, 1963, civic leaders established a nine-person City of Tulsa–Rogers County Port Authority. Appointed to represent Tulsa were Cass, Jacques Cunningham (the Authority’s first chair), John Robertson, Marcus R. Tower, Houston Adams, and R. N. Hughes. Paul R. Pixley, Philip R. Rhees, and L. A. Riggs represented Rogers County.
The last section of the waterway, from Muskogee to the soon-to-be-dedicated Tulsa Port of Catoosa, was opened on December 31, 1970. On January 5, 1971, the waterway was named for U.S. Sen. John L. McClellan of Arkansas and U.S. Sen. Robert S. Kerr of Oklahoma. Both had worked to realize the dream of a navigable waterway. As a former Oklahoma governor and as chair of the U.S. Senate Rivers and Harbors Subcommittee of the Public Works Committee, Kerr had used his political power to secure the project’s funding.