The article review(文章导读):
EXPLORATIONS – The MississippiBy Oliver Chanler
Broadcast: Wednesday, January 26, 2005
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
This is Steve Ember with Explorations in VOA Special English. Today, Shirley Griffith a
Text(正文):
EXPLORATIONS – The Mississippi
By Oliver Chanler
Broadcast: Wednesday, January 26, 2005
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
This is Steve Ember with Explorations in VOA Special English. Today, Shirley Griffith and I tell about one of the biggest rivers in the United States, the Mississippi.
(MUSIC)
VOICE ONE:
The Mississippi River. (Picture - NPS)
The Mississippi flows from near the northern border of the United States south into the Gulf of Mexico. The river flows for more than three thousand seven hundred kilometers through the center of the country. It is the one of the longest rivers in the world. Only four rivers in the world are longer. They are the Nile in Africa, the Amazon in South America, the Yangtze in China and the Missouri in the United States.
The name, Mississippi, came from the Chippewa Indians who lived in what is now the north central part of the United States. Their name for the river was "maesi-sipu". In the Chippewa language this meant "river of many fishes". The word was not easy for European explorers to say. So they began calling it the Mississippi instead. Today, it is often called "Old Man River"
Modern maps show that Little Elk Lake in the north central state of Minnesota is the true beginning of the Mississippi River. Little Elk Lake is only about four kilometers long.
VOICE TWO:
At its beginning, the Mississippi does not look like much of a river. But it grows as it starts moving slowly north before turning west and then south.
What is called the Upper Mississippi ends in southern Illinois, near a city with an Egyptian name – Cairo. However, in this middle western state it is called Kay-ro. At Cairo, another large river, the Ohio River, joins the expanding Mississippi.
It is easy to see how the Upper Mississippi has flowed through the land. It has cut its way through mountains of rock, pushing and pushing its waters slowly south.
VOICE ONE:
The Lower Mississippi begins south of Cairo. It is often higher than the land along it. The land is protected by man-made levees, which are walls of earth. These levees prevent the river from flooding. Some of these levees are higher and longer than the Great Wall of China. If you stand behind some of the levees you look up at the river and boats sailing on it.
While the levees control the river, the land is safe. But when heavy rains fall on the hundreds of big and little rivers that flow into the Mississippi, the land is threatened. If the levees break, the river can spread its fingers across the land, flooding towns and villages and destroying crops growing in fields.
VOICE TWO:
There are hundreds of big and little islands throughout the Mississippi River. These islands are formed by dirt carried along by the flow of the powerful river. Every year, the river carries five-hundred-million tons of dirt. Islands can form quickly, sometimes between the time a ship sails down the river and returns.
United States government engineers work hard to keep the river safe. They destroy islands built by the river to keep it clear for ships and trade. They also work to keep the levees strong so that the river does not break through them. Still, Old Man River does not like to be controlled. Every few years the Mississippi River changes its path or floods many thousands of hectares. |
