As for water carriage elsewhere, the rivers soon followed the canals in steady decline of relative importance. On the southern streams, such as the Cumberland and Tennessee, the principal diversion to the railroads of traffic in foodstuffs south bound from the West, took place in the five years subsequent to 1866.[17] High-water mark in the Mississippi trade was reached in 1879, the year of the completion of the jetties for the improvement of navigation at the mouth of the river. A steady decline thereafter has ensued down to the present day. New Orleans had then only recently engaged in foreign trade in grain. Exports of wheat and flour (equivalent) had suddenly risen from less than 1,000,000 bushels in 1875 to over 12,000,000 bushels in 1880. At this time this came principally by river. It was nearly ten years later before the Illinois Central actively engaged in such export business. But when the railroads finally seized upon it, the river trade was doomed. The only exception to this decrease of inland water transportation occurred on the Great Lakes. The carriage of coal, iron ore, and lumber rapidly increased. Through the Detroit river, the tonnage grew from 9,000,000 in 1873 to 20,000,000 tons in 1880; and through the St. Mary's Canal from 403,000 in 1860 to 1,734,000 tons in 1880. Inasmuch as a fair proportion of this rapidly growing business was ultimately destined to reach the seaboard either as raw material or in the form of manufactures, this water traffic contributed to, rather than lessened the prosperity of the trunk lines operating east of the lakes. The growing importance of railroads during the seventies was accompanied by collateral developments, which deserve mention in a general preliminary survey. The abuses of personal discrimination and favoritism, constantly recurring rate wars and disturbances, the financial scandals of construction companies and subsidiary corporations, the frauds perpetrated by unscrupulous financiers like Gould and Fiske, coupled with the arrogance of railroad managements, aroused widespread public hostility. This led to an insistent demand for public regulation and control. The Granger movement formed its open expression in the western states. The searching inquiries of the famous Hepburn Committee of the New York legislature in 1879 voiced it in the East. The Windom report of 1874 was called forth on behalf of the Federal government. The first railroad commission, that of Massachusetts in 1869, was soon followed by others all over the country. And a campaign of education was set under way which finally led to the Federal inquiries of the Cullom Committee of 1886 and the Federal Act to Regulate Commerce of the following year. * * * * *