By the middle of the nineteenth century improvements in steam technology made it possible for shipping companies to schedule regular voyages between U.S. and foreign ports. This advertisement identifies one of the firms that ran steamships between New Orleans and two key ports to its south. Aspinwall was a new port on the Caribbean coast of the Isthmus of Panama, then part of Colombia. Mail, passengers and goods were carried to Aspinwall for overland transport to the Pacific where they were loaded onto vessels bound for ports on that side of the world. Note, too, that the regular New York-New Orleans route traveled by way of Havana. [1854 Cohen's New Orleans Directory for 1854]

Exports/Imports at New Orleans Week of October 9, 1854 Exports Tampico Cotton, Hams, Butter, Cheese, Rosin, Tar, Pitch, Paper, Flour, Merchandize, Sugar, Lumber Havana Tallow, Hams, Lard, Cheese, Butter, Staves Vera Cruz Coal Imports Havana Fruit, Cigars, Merchandize, Sweetmeats, Tobacco, Sugar, Coffee Matanzas Sugar Rio de Janiero Coffee Vera Cruz Sugar, Coffee, Cigars, Fruit, Tobacco [Compiled from reports in the New Orleans Commercial Bulletin, October 9-14, 1854]