Plot Synopsis

RIVERMEN chronicles river men who work tirelessly to survive the frequent challenges and grave dangers of life on the water, while struggling for their very existence. They live aboard their vessels in search of freedom and risking everything on their quest to thrive along these incredible American waterways. Whether it's modifying their homemade vessel to navigate storms, using unconventional methods to save their boats from certain destruction, harvesting food from the occasionally sparse environment or risking bodily harm in thrashing whitewater, these river hackers must overcome all that nature throws at them, or risk perishing in the merciless wild. The river men are: John 'Trapper John' Tapley, a fisherman who has been making his living on the Wabash, Embarras, Saline and Ohio rivers between Illinois and Indiana for nearly 60 years; Captain Lee Young, who, with his cat Rebecca, resides year-round on a homemade barge, the Huckleberry, a houseboat made out of natural and salvaged materials such as driftwood, bamboo chutes, rope, two leaking pontoons and a derelict canoe, which he's using to flee northeastern Florida in search of refuge in the remote Ten Thousand Islands of Florida's Everglades; Kirk McGeorge and Mike Porten, longtime friends and professional boat-runners for hire, who have sailed the world's oceans together and are now delivering a 30-foot sailboat from San Francisco to the Northwest's most inland seaport of Lewiston, Idaho; and Seaver Baruch and Mike O'Brien, year-round whitewater river extremists, who are attempting to run Alaska's massive and frigid Copper River for 200 unforgiving miles in a 15-foot, open, wooden dory boat.
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On Monday, April 27, 2015 at 10pm ET/PT, History premiered the season finale of RIVERMEN. In the season ender, "Sink or Swim," a bad choice ends in disaster in a massive storm in Florida when Captain Lee gambles on the seaworthiness of the Huckleberry. Then, in Illinois, an old family trick handed down from his grandfather may save Trapper in his hunt for huge flathead catfish. Later, after a dangerous maneuver that damages the vessel, a disappointed Kirk and Mike must give their client some bad news. Finally, Seaver and Mike battle massive whitewater, automobile sized icebergs and the most densely populated grizzly territory yet when they enter the most dangerous stretch of their journey along Alaska's Copper River.