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The Obion River system is the primary
The Obion has four major forks, the North Fork, Middle Fork, South Fork and Rutherford Fork (which is named after Henry Rutherford an early surveyor of the area). The confluences of these forks are a few miles above the mouth of the Obion's discharge into the
surface water
Surface water is water located on top of land forming terrestrial (inland) waterbodies, and may also be referred to as ''blue water'', opposed to the seawater and waterbodies like the ocean.
The vast majority of surface water is produced by prec ...
drainage system of northwestern Tennessee
Tennessee ( , ), officially the State of Tennessee, is a landlocked state in the Southeastern region of the United States. Tennessee is the 36th-largest by area and the 15th-most populous of the 50 states. It is bordered by Kentucky to th ...
, United States.
Description
The Obion has four major forks, the North Fork, Middle Fork, South Fork and Rutherford Fork (which is named after Henry Rutherford an early surveyor of the area). The confluences of these forks are a few miles above the mouth of the Obion's discharge into the Mississippi River
The Mississippi River is the second-longest river and chief river of the second-largest drainage system in North America, second only to the Hudson Bay drainage system. From its traditional source of Lake Itasca in northern Minnesota, it f ...
. For the greater parts of their lengths, the forks exist as separate streams
A stream is a continuous body of water, body of surface water Current (stream), flowing within the stream bed, bed and bank (geography), banks of a channel (geography), channel. Depending on its location or certain characteristics, a stream ...
.
In the mid-20th century, the Obion system was largely channelized for agricultural
Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating Plant, plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of Sedentism, sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of Domestication, domesticated species created food ...
purposes, under the auspices of the ''Obion-Forked Deer Basin Authority'', a Tennessee state agency that coordinated this work with the United States Army Corps of Engineers
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. Some of the adverse effects of channelization included increasing erosion of land, loss of wildlife habitat, and increased flooding downstream. But with the restoration of wetlands
A wetland is a distinct ecosystem that is flooded or saturated by water, either permanently (for years or decades) or seasonally (for weeks or months). Flooding results in oxygen-free (anoxic) processes prevailing, especially in the soils. The ...
along the river in the 21st century, this process has now been halted and – in a few places – somewhat reversed.
The origin of the name "Obion" is obscure. Some say that it is derived from a Native American word and others that it represents a corruption of the name of an Irish
Irish may refer to:
Common meanings
* Someone or something of, from, or related to:
** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe
***Éire, Irish language name for the isle
** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...
fur trapper, O'Bion or, perhaps, O'Brien.
Obion County, Tennessee, is named after the Obion River.
After the 1818 Chickasaw
The Chickasaw ( ) are an indigenous people of the Southeastern Woodlands. Their traditional territory was in the Southeastern United States of Mississippi, Alabama, and Tennessee as well in southwestern Kentucky. Their language is classified as ...
cession of West Tennessee
West Tennessee is one of the three Grand Divisions (Tennessee), Grand Divisions of the U.S. state of Tennessee that roughly comprises the western quarter of the state. The region includes 21 counties between the Tennessee River, Tennessee and Miss ...
(known in Kentucky as Jackson Purchase
The Jackson Purchase, also known as the Purchase Region or simply the Purchase, is a region in the U.S. state of Kentucky bounded by the Mississippi River to the west, the Ohio River to the north, and the Tennessee River to the east.
Jackson's ...
), explorer Davy Crockett
David Crockett (August 17, 1786 – March 6, 1836) was an American folk hero, frontiersman, soldier, and politician. He is often referred to in popular culture as the "King of the Wild Frontier". He represented Tennessee in the U.S. House of Re ...
moved to the South Fork Obion River in Weakley County (present-day Gibson County after restructuring of the county in 1837). There he built a log cabin along the River, where he and his family resided until his trip to Texas
Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...
in 1835.
See also
*List of Tennessee rivers
This is a list of rivers of the U.S. state of Tennessee:
By drainage basin
This list is arranged by drainage basin, with respective tributaries indented under each larger stream's name. All rivers in Tennessee ultimately flow to the Gulf of Mex ...
References
External links
{{authority control Rivers of Tennessee Tributaries of the Mississippi River Rivers of Dyer County, Tennessee Bodies of water of Gibson County, Tennessee Bodies of water of Lauderdale County, Tennessee Bodies of water of Obion County, Tennessee