Flow: The Life and Times of Philadelphia's Schuylkill River

Beth Kephart

Nov 2014 · Temple University Press

About this ebook

The Schuylkill River-the name in Dutch means "hidden creek"-courses many miles, turning through Philadelphia before it yields to the Delaware. "I am this wide. I am this deep. A tad voluptuous, but only in places," writes Beth Kephart, capturing the voice of this natural resource in Flow. An award-winning author, Kephart's elegant, impressionistic story of the Schuylkill navigates the beating heart of this magnificent water source. Readers are invited to flow through time-from the colonial era and Ben Franklin's death through episodes of Yellow Fever and the Winter of 1872, when the river froze over-to the present day. Readers will feel the silt of the Schuylkill's banks, swim with its perch and catfish, and cruise-or scull-downstream, from Reading to Valley Forge to the Water Works outside center city. Flow's lush narrative is peppered with lovely, black and white photographs and illustrations depicting the river's history, its people, and its gorgeous vistas. Written with wisdom and with awe for one of the oldest friends of all Philadelphians, Flow is a perfect book for reading while the ice melts, and for slipping in your bag for your own visit to the Schuylkill.

About the author

Beth Kephart is the award-winning author of five memoirs, including Still Love in Strange Places and the March 2005 Book Sense pick Ghosts in the Garden. She has been nominated for a National Book Award, has been awarded grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Pew Fellowships in the Arts, and has won the national Speakeasy Poetry Prize. She has written for "The New York Times," "Washington Post Book World," "Chicago Tribune," Salon.com, "Philadelphia magazine," and "The Philadelphia Inquirer," among other publications, and her essays are frequently anthologized.