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Note: Soon after his marriage, Joseph entered into the hardware business on Market Street, Philadelphia, PA, in partnership with Samuel Lippincott. Joseph realized at an early date the important of travel by river and was a pioneer in river navigation being identified with early steam boating on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers and proving the practicability of the navigation of those rivers.
In 1811 he left Philadelphia with the intention of traveling on horseback to St. Louis, MO and other places in the Western and Southern states for the purpose of collecting debts due the firm and for extending its business. In Brownsville, Fayette County, PA, he met Elisha and Caleb Hunt who were conducting a mercantile business there. They prevailed upon him to assist them in building and freighting a keel boat to St. Louis, whereby he could make his trip more pleasant.
In the spring of 1812, Joseph White and Caleb Hunt with a crew of French Canadian boatmen started their keel boat from the landing of Brownsville bound for St. Louis. It was a comparatively easy trip to the mouth of the Ohio River but the trip up the Mississippi River to St. Louis was difficult, the boat being pulled up the stream by a long rope held by men on the shore. Such arduous labor was well calculated to lead a reflective mind to consider if some other power could not be successfully applied for propelling boats against the current. On the return trip, a keel boat was taken to the mouth of the Cumberland Riber, KY, from where the rest of the trip was made on horseback. At Bowling Green, Warren County, KY, Joseph White fell in with the proprietor of a cave (Mammoth Cave) who wanted to sell it for $10,000. He said he was making 100 pounds of salt peter per day and was making a nice profit.
During the autumn of 1812, Elisha Hunt visited Joseph in Philadelphia and while there, they examined a little stern-wheeler steamboat built under a patent owned by Daniel French of Connecticut and the running as a ferry boat between Cooper's Point, NJ and Philadelphia. French informed them he could construct steamboats that would run 5 miles per hour against the current of the Mississippi River. As a result, a successful stock company was formed to construct the steamboats and carry passengers and freight between Pittsburgh, PA and New Orleans, LA.
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