Mile 873.7 - LBD Bixby Towhead Light

John Ruskey

20 Apr 2026 � 1 min read

873.7 LBD Bixby Towhead Light

Bixby Towhead has migrated to the Tennessee shore, and steamboat Captain Bixby is long gone. But his story has been immortalized by one of America’s greatest authors. Captain Horace Bixby was one of the best-known steamboat pilots on the river. He was piloting an old boat called the Paul Jones when a boy named Samuel Clemens left his home in Hannibal, Missouri, and went down the Mississippi, determined to become a pilot. For the modest sum of $500, Horace Bixby agreed to let young Clemens serve as his "cub pilot," so that he could "learn the river." Later in his life, Captain Bixby would be harrassed by newspaper reporters and others who wanted him to tell them what he knew about the youngster who had become the famous writer, Mark Twain. In exasperation, the old pilot once exclaimed: "I wish that fellow Twain was dead!"

When Mark Twain did in fact die in 1910, Captain Bixby wanted to set the record straight. For years, river men had belittled Twain's knowledge of the river and his ability as a steamboat pilot. One well-worn witticism was: "That fellow Twain knows a hell of a lot more about book-writing than he ever did about steamboats.” Bixby had some surprising news for the reporters who questioned him after Twain's death.

"Sam Clemens was a good pilot," the old man declared firmly. "He was also a smart fellow, and it was his brains that made other pilots jealous and led them to say he didn't know the river-that he was just an inspired loafer, or something of the sort. What they said wasn't true; Clemens was a good pilot -- and he learned it from me."

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