250 years ago today, a fourteen-year-old boy commanding a party of 30 men began construction on a small handful of rough timber cabins clinging to the western bank of the Mississippi River. Crossing the ice-cold water by boat the previous day in late winter of 1764, he had arrived on behalf of his stepfather to found a fur trading post at the edge of the known world. Thus began St. Louis, Missouri. As the thud of their axe strokes echoed across the lonely wilderness, a bitter wind would have Continue Reading