Throughout the 19th century, Congress passed a series of initiatives to improve navigation on the Tennessee River between the river's mouth and Florence, Alabama. By the 1890s, a continuous channel had been secured, but was still deemed insufficient for major river traffic. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers conducted an extensive survey of the lower river in the early 1900s, and recommended constructing a dam at Aurora Landing (roughly above the present site), but the project was never funded. In the 1930s, the Tennessee Valley Authority sought to create a continuous minimum channel along the entirety of the river from Paducah to Knoxville. The Authority also sought to help control flooding on the lower Mississippi River, especially in the aftermath of the destructive Ohio River flood of 1937. Research had shown that 4% of the water in the lower Mississippi originates in the Tennessee River watershed. TVA surveyed the lower part of the river and considered the Aurora Landing site, but eventually settled on the present site at river mile 22.4. The Kentucky Dam project was authorized by Congress on May 23, 1938, and construction began July 1, 1938.