By Gregg Andrews

Yesterday, I learned that my new book, Shantyboats and Roustabouts: The River Poor of St. Louis, 1875-1930 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2023), has won the North American Society for Oceanic History’s John Lyman Book Award in the category of US Maritime History. On behalf of the thousands of shantyboat wayfarers and roustabouts who lived, labored, and struggled in the Mississippi River Valley and shaped its cultural history in the age of Mark Twain and beyond, I am particularly thrilled to receive this award. If only my maternal grandmother’s kinfolks who were part of the shantyboat culture in Hannibal could be here to enjoy it with me!