Saint Lawrence River

From Freepedia

Saint Lawrence River
Image:Grlakes lawrence map.png Map of the St. Lawrence/Great Lakes Watershed
Origin	North River, Mesabi Range, Minnesota
Mouth	Gulf of St. Lawrence/Atlantic Ocean
Basin Countries	Canada (Ontario, Quebec) United States (Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Wisconsin)
Length	3,058 km (1,900 mi)
Source Elevation	250 m (820 ft)
Avg. Discharge	10,400 m³/s (367,328 ft³/s)
Watershed Area	1,030,000 km² (397,683 mi²)

The Saint Lawrence River (French: fleuve Saint-Laurent) is a large west-to-east flowing river in the middle latitudes of North America, connecting the Great Lakes with the Atlantic Ocean. It was called Kaniatarowanenneh ("big waterway") in Mohawk. It traverses the Canadian province of Quebec and forms part of the border between the state of New York in the United States and the province of Ontario in Canada.

The Saint Lawrence River is born at the outflow of Lake Ontario at Kingston, Ontario. From there, it passes Brockville, Cornwall, Montreal, Trois-Rivières, and Quebec City before draining into the Gulf of Saint Lawrence, the largest estuary in the world. It runs 1,900 miles (3,058 kilometers) from source to mouth (744 miles or 1,197 km from the outflow of Lake Ontario). Its drainage area, which includes the Great Lakes and hence the world's largest system of fresh water lakes, has a size of 1.03 million km². The average discharge at the mouth is 10,400 m³/s.

The river includes Lac Saint-Louis south of Montreal, Lac Saint-François at Salaberry-de-Valleyfield, Quebec and Lac Saint-Pierre east of Montreal. It surrounds such islands as the Thousand Islands near Kingston, the Island of Montreal, Île Jésus (Laval), Île d'Orléans near Quebec City, and Anticosti Island north of the Gaspé.

Lake Champlain and the Ottawa, Richelieu, and Saguenay rivers drain into the St. Lawrence.

The first European to navigate the St. Lawrence was Jacques Cartier, who on 9 June 1534 first sighted the river and also claimed New France for Francis I. Until the early 1600s, the French used the name Rivière du Canada to designate the Saint Lawrence upstream to Montreal and the Ottawa River after Montreal. The Saint Lawrence River served as the main route for exploration of the North American interior from Europe.

The St. Lawrence was formerly continuously navigable only as far as Montreal due to the Lachine Rapids. The Lachine Canal was the first to allow ships to pass the rapids; the Saint Lawrence Seaway, an extensive system of canals and locks, now permits ocean-going vessels to pass all the way to Lake Superior.

In the late 1970's, the river was the subject of a successful environmental campaign (called "Save the River"), originally responding to planned development by the Army Corps of Engineers. The campaign was organised, among others, by Abbie Hoffmann, who at the time was on the run under the pseudonym of Barry Freed.

Image:DSCN4262 rmosesspstlawrence e.jpg

1 Names
2 Crossings
3 See also
4 External links

Names

A note on translation: Occasionally, the French name fleuve Saint-Laurent is wrongly translated as Saint Lawrence Seaway, on the idea that it uses the word fleuve, not rivière. However, the word fleuve simply means a river that runs to the sea, and is appropriately translated by river. The seaway is a system of artificial canals, and is called in French voie maritime du Saint-Laurent.

The source of the North River in the Mesabi Range in Minnesota is considered to be the source of the Saint Lawrence River. Because it crosses so many lakes, the Saint Lawrence River frequently changes its name. From source to mouth, the names are: