The history of the Mississippi River Valley is told in text and pictures through the adventures of Minn, a snapping turtle, as she travels downstream. The fascinating world of the river; bayou’s, steamboats, river pirates, flatboats and keelboats, French and Spanish explorers, plantations, floods, and Mark Twain is all here excitingly related.

Born in Jackson County, Michigan, in 1900, Holling Clancy Holling graduated from the Art Institute of Chicago in 1923. He then worked in a taxidermy department of the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago and spent time working in anthropology under Dr. Ralph Linton. During this period, he married Lucille Webster and within a year of their marriage accepted a position as art instructor on the first University World Cruise, sponsored by New York University. For many years, Holling C. Holling dedicated much of his time and interest to making books for children. Much of the material he used was known to him first hand, and his wife, Lucille, worked with him on many of the illustrations.