America has more than 250,000 rivers, coursing over more than 3 million miles, and over the years we have harnessed their power with waterwheels and dams, straightened them for ships, drained them with irrigation canals, set them on fire, and even attempted to restore them. Proving that America's history is inseparable from its rivers, Martin Doyle explores the U.S. Constitution's roots in interstate river navigation, the discovery of gold in 1848, and the construction of the Hoover Dam, to the failure of the levees in Hurricane Katrina and the water wars in the west.