LARRY CAMPBELL: You're on this two-lane highway, and you're the only one on there.

And there's at least one picture in the book where I just came to the top of a hill.

And you know, I just stopped the car.

You could step out, take a picture, look going back.

It was really interesting to me.

I came to treasure those mornings when I went from one town to another, just the quiet and the scenery and everything.

[THEME MUSIC] Since the earliest days of exploration, the Ozarks has been shaped and defined by the mighty rivers winding through its hills and valleys, none more notable than the Missouri River.

From the pioneering journeys of Lewis and Clark to modern-day adventurers drawn to sweeping vistas and breathtaking landscapes, the Missouri River continues to captivate our imagination.

Our guest today is Larry Campbell, who has followed in this tradition of discovery with a remarkable road trip spanning more than 2,300 miles, which he has expertly captured in his book, "Rolling Down the River, Discovering People and Places Along the Mighty Missouri."

Join me as we dive into Larry's epic journey.

[MUSIC PLAYING] ANNOUNCER: Ozarks Public Television and Missouri State University are proud to present "OzarksWatch Video Magazine," a locally produced program committed to increasing the understanding of the richness and complexity of Ozarks culture.

Visit our website for more information.

Well, thanks for being with me today.

We have a very interesting show.

And I've always been interested in the Missouri River, so I'm really fascinated by it-- I was too.

JIM BAKER: --and everything else.

Before we get started, though, why don't you talk a little bit about yourself and then how you got into this great adventure.

LARRY CAMPBELL: Oh.

OK, well-- well, I was a math professor here at MSU for a while.

And I retired a little tiny bit early, because I wanted to do some things, and I-- you know, while I still was young, which I'm not anymore, but-- [LAUGHS] And I wasn't sure what those things were.

And then it was roughly 2015, January, something like that.

I had a friend here in Springfield that just called me up out of the blue and said, you know, there's a new book out that you'd be interested in.

This gal followed the Mississippi River from start to finish, and she took 90 days.

And turns out, it's Gayle Harper, and she lives here in Springfield.

And-- yeah.

And I remember thinking when he was talking that, before I even met Gayle, before I even saw the book, I remember thinking, wouldn't that be a fun thing to do on the Missouri?

And I thought it was a passing thought.

Well, it passed, but it came back [LAUGHS] and it grabbed me by the throat, and it just hung around.

And finally, about a year later, I thought, OK, we're going to do this.

And I started planning.

I started writing chambers and river towns all up and down the river and saying, you know, I'm thinking of doing this.

What-- what-- where should I go if I come to your town?

And things like that.

And I got marvelous responses.

Over half of the chambers volunteered to put me up while I was there, so that helped with the wallet.

So-- so and I-- so I finally scheduled it.

So I took off on August 1 from Three Forks, Montana, and then left in mid-July.

Gave me time to get out there, because I hadn't been across the Dakotas.

Did some stuff on the way out there.

So that's how it all started.

It was kind of-- almost out of nowhere.

But once it got going, the momentum was really going.

So really, it was like a reversed Lewis and Clark, essentially.

LARRY CAMPBELL: You know, it's really fascinating you'd say that, because-- because I'm sure we may talk about them.

I don't know.

But I had to make an interesting decision at the start, because people asked that same question.

Are you making a reverse Lewis and Clark trip?

And I had to think.

Am I going to do that, or am I going to follow the river?

If I have to make a decision, you know, am I going to go-- so I finally decided, OK, I'm following the Missouri River.

If I-- you know, if I'm only in a town for two or three days, I have to make a decision.

It'll be, what's going on in the river or the people or whatever, rather than Lewis and Clark.

But you can't go 10 feet on the Missouri River without running into Lewis and Clark.

And so-- so I ran into a lot of that also.

In fact, nowadays, one of the talks I even do is Lewis and Clark on the Missouri River, because there's so much-- so much history connected-- Yeah, I lived in Idaho for a long time, and it was impossible to go almost any place in southern Idaho, and especially along the Columbia, eventually Snake River-- LARRY CAMPBELL: Oh, yeah.

Out there.

Yeah.

And so there was just always the Lewis and Clark journals and all the different publications and stuff.

LARRY CAMPBELL: Well, it was-- I mean, besides the trip itself, but it became almost a joke.

It was fascinating to me.

Almost as I came into any town, it just felt like somewhere in the middle of town would be this plaque that said, the Lewis and Clark trip almost ended here because-- [LAUGHS] And you know, there were several places.

That was just an amazing trip, and a lot of things-- you know, it's interesting when you study it in 5th grade, but to be there, some of the places that they stood, you know, just added to the trip along the Missouri.

JIM BAKER: I've always thought that the best education is to travel.

LARRY CAMPBELL: Oh, absolutely.

If you can experience things physically and see it and all that-- and then you can always-- I used to always travel, but then I'd go back and read about where I was at instead of-- LARRY CAMPBELL: Well, I purposely-- as far as Lewis and Clark, I purposely did not read the best book and so on until after I'd made the trip.

And I didn't do a lot of advanced research on the river part of it either.

I wanted to see it and see the townspeople and hear it from them.

So-- JIM BAKER: Yeah, I think that's a good approach, because you just have a fresh-- whatever perspective you want to have on it, because that's what you were doing.

It was a personal journey.

And so, you know, you might as well dictate how it goes.

Well, and indeed, that was part of the balance that was hard to get.

Many of the towns were so-- they were anxious or glad that I was there.

They wanted to show off their town.

And I had to look for a balance between wanting to be out on my own, exploring, and the towns that would, you know, almost schedule me for every minute.

Oh, you've got to meet this guy or you got to meet this-- see this place on the river or whatever.

So when I-- when I was looking at the thing, the first thing I thought about when I saw that you took-- you went by car-- Yeah.

And so my first thought was, OK, how parallel are the roads for 2,300-something-- Yeah, exact-- --to the river, because rivers tend to meander.

[LAUGHS] Absolutely.

You know, I decided to go by car because you can meet more people there.

You can learn more stuff.

And the upper half of the river's got 14 dams on it.

So it's-- you know, it's hard to do.

People do it.

They go the whole river by canoe.

And they don't even stop in St. Louis.

They go all the way to the Gulf.

But it was easier to do by car.

And I tried to stay away from the beaten path.

I mean, the main highways.

[LAUGHS] You get into the Dakotas, and even the term beaten path [LAUGHS] has a different meaning.

I remember one time I was going from one town to another.

I was on this highway off of this about-- I was four steps down the off-the-beaten-path road.

But you know, you can't drive along the gravel bar, as you say, but I tried to stay as close as I could to the river.

And that got me on a lot of interesting back roads, which, in and of themselves were fascinating.

JIM BAKER: Oh, I would think the back roads would be-- LARRY CAMPBELL: Oh, you know, two or three times you-- you're on this two-lane highway, and you're the only one on there.

And there's at least one picture in the book where I just came to the top of a hill.

And you know, I just stopped the car.

You could step out, take a picture, look going back.

It was really interesting to me.

I came to treasure those mornings when I went from one town to another, just the quiet and the scenery and everything.

JIM BAKER: So what was the-- the farthest that you actually got away from the river?

I mean, when the roads were just not close enough-- LARRY CAMPBELL: Yeah, there was a spot on the river that's called the Missouri-- Missouri Breaks.

It starts in Fort Benton, I think, and goes across northern Montana.

And it is very much like it-- like the river was then.

And you can't even get to it without spending a day or so on the car.

So when I went across-- when I left Fort Benton and went across northern Montana, I missed a good part of the river there because I just-- it would just would have added to the trip to have to go there.

I have almost two or three times since then-- you know, you can take a canoe trip on that part of the river and see like it was back then and what Lewis and Clark saw, and so on, but I've never done it.

Yeah, that's a good point.

That was about the only place I couldn't at least get to the river fairly quickly if I wanted to.

JIM BAKER: Because a lot of the roads would follow the river.

LARRY CAMPBELL: Yeah.

So that's the way they were designed in the first place, I guess.

So-- well, you mentioned your book, and so let's talk a little bit about the book.

And then I want to start off in Montana and work our way down the river.

LARRY CAMPBELL: OK. [LAUGHTER] We'll do this not chronologically, but we'll-- LARRY CAMPBELL: With the time we have, we'll probably get stuck in North Dakota, but that's OK.

So in your book, what-- what inspired you to do the book?

Was that a forethought, or was it something that came about?

It was a little bit of both.

I mean, I told you about this gal that-- that lives here in Springfield that did the one on the Mississippi.

And I ended up getting to talk to her and visit and get some advice, and see her book and read her book.

She and I have different styles, but it was really nice.

And that-- her publishing company, I talked to them.

And so they were interested.

There were no guarantees, of course.

And so I took the trip.

I just decided, I'm taking the trip.

But I knew that a book was a possibility.

So when I got back in September of that year, then I sat down-- I took all of the pictures in the book.

I-- I don't call myself a photographer, but I-- you know, a lot of pictures.

It's a coffee table-type book and all the pictures I took.

So I took those, and I had those.

And I had the journal as I went down there.

So I sat down and put together, you know, visits to the cities, and so on.

And by the time I finished, I had a book.

Of course, there's a section on the cities I visited, and then some of the side trips.

There's a whole section on Lewis and Clark.

And then there's a section on the 12 human interest or human treasures, I called them.

I mean, one of the magnificent things about the trip was the people I met.

But I-- you know, I felt I was a little unfair, but I pulled out about 12 of them and wrote a little story about each one of them, and that's a section in the book too.

And that was just-- Before we start our drive down the river, there's the places.

What were the most interesting places that you encountered?

LARRY CAMPBELL: Oh-- oh, Jim, I get asked that question.

And you know, it's not being political or diplomatic.

I didn't really have a favorite spot, and they were all fascinating in their own ways.

You know how that goes.

The most unique town I visited-- and it's simply a personal reason-- in Atchison, Kansas, which is the only Kansas stop I made.

I mean, the Missouri borders Missouri and Kansas there for a while.

And I was in Atchison, and I'll make a long story short.

I discovered that my great great grandfather was one of the 13 co-founders of Atchison, Kansas.

So that was just amazing.

It was one of those things where I just heard a name, and I thought, that sounds familiar.

So you know, the people in Atchison were delighted.

I was delighted.

We spent two days, pinning down-- making sure this guy was indeed my great great grandfather.

And so that was probably the most unique stop.

But the cities ran all the way from, you know, little small towns, in a sense.

I mean, before this went on, we were talking about Hermann, Missouri.

You know, that's just a marvelous little river town, all the way up to Helena, Montana.

Or you know, I went through four state capitals, counting Jeff City.

And you know, so they were all different, and they were all beautiful.

You get me going, and I could go forever.

Well, you know, even Helena, Montana, was just-- it isn't really a river town.

It's about three or four miles from the river.

But it's-- it's so beautiful.

I saw it ahead of time.

And I thought, I've got to stop there.

And that was-- that town, it had a huge gold rush find.

I forget the year.

And it probably would have gone the way of all the other ghost towns.

I mean, of river gold finding towns.

Maybe became a ghost town, but then it got the capital designation.

So nowadays, they're extremely proud of their Western heritage, you know?

The gold mining days, and so on.

But they're also a state capital.

So it's the most unique blend of past and present and, you know, cowboy and politician, so to speak.

It's-- it's simultaneously the biggest small town I was in and the smallest big city, right?

[LAUGHS] Just fascinating.

And-- and you know, every time I left a town, it was-- you know, it was hard to get in the car and go.

It was just such unique memories at each spot.

So what was the-- how much of a difference did you experience?

Because the western-- I used to live in the West, and it's a very different place.

LARRY CAMPBELL: Oh, yeah.

And so they're very proud of their western heritage, and there's-- I mean, and all that.

And then as you go along and you head towards St. Louis, what was the kind of differences that you experienced in the different-- I don't want to say culture, but just the heritages and the-- the different things?

There's-- there's two or three answers there.

One of them-- and I'll return to the heritage and culture.

But one of them was the river itself.

I mean, living here in Missouri, we're so used to-- when it goes across the state, it's big.

It's muddy.

You know, out there in Montana, it is just-- it's beautiful country, but the river itself is beautiful.

And it-- it just struck me all the way along as I was following.

It was just like a teenager trying to find its identity.

I mean, it would be-- it would be broad and shallow at some spots, narrow and shallow, but it was always shallow out there, at least in Montana.

I-- [LAUGHS] I tell the story of I was out for a morning walk one time in Fort Benton, and I was walking near the river and getting into kind of a nature area.

And I looked out, and there was this deer standing at the edge of the river.

And he or she and I stared at each other for a couple of minutes.

And it decided, OK, I've had enough of him.

And it turned and it bounded into the river.

And I thought, I've never seen a deer swim.

It didn't.

It bounded all the way across the river.

Never got deeper than knee deep.

It just-- it was fascinating.

But culture-wise, yes.

As-- you know, you're in Montana.

You hear Big Sky country, and you think it's a promotion.

It's an understatement.

I mean, it's so beautiful.

It's so wide open.

And then as you get along, about halfway down the river, by the time you get to Sioux City, the cities are getting bigger.

The river's getting wider.

You know, that's kind of what you'd expect.

But I had an interesting-- I had a visit with one of my human treasures in South Dakota, in Pierre, that luckily I found out they call it "Peer."

JIM BAKER: Yeah.

In 5th grade, I thought it was "Pi-air."

But he lived in Pierre.

And he took me out driving, out where they filmed "Dances with Wolves."

And you know, so if you've seen the movie, you know that it's just wide open out there.

And he said two interesting things, and one of them speaks to what you're saying.

One of them was he was driving through there and he said, people that say there's nothing to see out here don't know what they're looking at.

And just when he said it, I could feel it.

It was just so majestic out there.

And then he said, the river itself here in the Dakotas is-- if it's not a continental divide, it's a cultural divide.

West side is cowboys, east side is farmers, almost all the way down the Dakotas.

So that's the kind of change you're talking about.

It just-- you get out there.

And of course, you know, we love Missouri.

We love the river coming across Missouri.

But you know, there's no divide between cowboys and farmers down here, and that's different out there.

And it's just interesting.

JIM BAKER: Yeah, when I was in-- I lived in Idaho for a long time, and the Great Basin was my favorite place.

And there's nothing there.

I mean, it's open.

But it's beautiful.

And it's-- my friends used to come visit me and say, how can you-- how can you even come out here?

This is-- it's just...

But there was such a peace that was involved in it and everything else.

Well, we've got a few minutes left.

Why don't we talk a little bit about some of the folks that-- that really impressed you?

And it's not like you're picking your favorite kid.

LARRY CAMPBELL: No.

Yeah, no, I know.

There were a variety of stories, and one of them was the story I just told you about, John Duffy there in Pierre.

Every one of those human treasures I picked out had some kind of interesting thing.

And I remember the stories, and you'll like this.

Their last name was Baker in-- in South Dakota at a bed and breakfast I stayed for two days along the trip.

And what was fascinating is that they were farmers, but she was from Switzerland.

Long story.

Foreign exchange student, so on and so forth.

And [LAUGHS] I felt a little silly asking it, but you know, it was almost a kind of question like, you're from Switzerland.

What are you doing in South Dakota?

How did you get here, you know?

I think I asked it more tactfully than that, but-- but she just-- she just lit up and she said, yeah, I know.

She said, and everybody knows how beautiful Switzerland is.

But she said, here-- she said in Europe, in Switzerland, everything's scrunched together.

She didn't use those terms.

She said, out here, it's so wide open.

I'm-- I'm free.

I can watch the sunset every night.

And that was such an interesting perspective to me.

And indeed, there's even a picture in the book.

I mean, the two days I was there, she was in her sunset chair every evening at sunset, watching the sun.

She said, we can't do this in Switzerland.

And I thought, what an interesting perspective, you know?

All of us here think Switzerland is so incredibly beautiful, and it is.

But she loved the wide open and the sunset, and so on.

So that's the kind of people I ran into in Ottawa.

Iowa?

No.

Is it Iowa?

Sioux City?

Yeah, south of Sioux City.

I met Butch Bouvier, who is a character.

But he has built-- if you ever run into one of the ships, the barges or the pirogues that Lewis and Clark had on the river, scale models, he built darn near all of them.

There's one up in-- in Boonville that he built in a museum.

And he is so interesting to listen to.

He talked about-- I mean, there's a whole museum up there that has his stuff in there.

Just all kinds of fascinating people that I ran into up and down the river.

We've just got a couple minutes left, but why don't we talk a little bit about your book?

And you can kind of explain the title and everything, and we'll put it on the screen and let people-- LARRY CAMPBELL: Well, OK.

I called it "Rolling Down the River."

You know, I forget exactly the subtitle.

I think it was "Exploring people and places along the Missouri," or something like that.

In fact, the publisher suggested that I do "Rolling Down the River."

They said, if you call it "Rolling on the River," then people Google it and they're going to get the song.

[LAUGHTER] Well, that's-- OK.

But yeah, it came out of the trip, as we talked earlier.

And there's a section on all the towns I visited, and then a section on the side trips.

I was in 27 cities overnight stays, seven states, and that's in there.

But then there's also this section on the human treasures, these 12 wonderful people/stories or couples.

And there's a whole section on Lewis and Clark.

So yeah, it turned out to be-- I was pleased with it.

I wasn't sure how it would look when I was working on it.

So how did it feel when you rolled into St. Louis and you see the rivers merging together?

LARRY CAMPBELL: It was there that particular day-- and I say this in the book.

That was the most-- when I stood at the confluence of the Missouri and the Mississippi, it was my last day on the trip.

And it was such an interesting feeling because, one, clearly, I had waited for this landmark, you know, the end of the Missouri, although I'm one of those that says it's the Missouri that goes to the Gulf and the Mississippi that comes into it.

[LAUGHS] But you know, here I was at the end of the trip.

I had been waiting seven weeks to get to this spot.

And yet, there was also this pull.

You know, headed down I-44 and be home that night.

So it's just-- it was a fascinating feeling.

Yeah.

Both accomplishment and sadness.

And you know, the river had been my friend for seven weeks.

I'd been within-- you know.

Yeah.

And when you think of the history of the world, rivers are such an important part of everything that's happened-- LARRY CAMPBELL: And the Missouri is the-- it's so much more interesting than the Mississippi.

I may have to get up-- get up and go up to Hermann and look-- LARRY CAMPBELL: There you go.

I mean, the Mississippi just comes straight south, and the Missouri goes all over the place and all kinds of differences, and you know-- and so on.

Well, thank you for being with me today.

Really appreciate it.

Thank you for having me.

[LAUGHS] I enjoy talking about it.

We'll be right back.

[MUSIC PLAYING] ANNOUNCER: Ozarks Public Television and Missouri State University are proud to present "OzarksWatch Video Magazine," a locally produced program committed to increasing the understanding of the richness and complexity of Ozarks culture.

Visit our website for more information.

I want to thank our guest, Larry Campbell, for talking with us today and sharing some of the amazing experiences and photographs from his journey along the Missouri River.

Thank you for joining us, and we'll s you next time on "OzarksWatch Video Magazine."

[THEME MUSIC]