Illinois

This map was taken from The Inland Waterways of North America by David Edwards-May.

Canal History

The Mississippi River flows along the west border of the state, offering a water connection to the south and the Gulf of Mexico, and most of the state sits in the Mississippi watershed, meaning that with the except of a couple of rivers near Chicago, most of the rivers flow to the south.

A section of a 1861 Mississippi River watershed map. The _._._ line shows the watershed divides.

The Illinois River and its largest tributary, the Des Plaines, create a water route that comes within 10 miles of Chicago, and are separated by a small ridge that forms the break in the two watersheds. The canals of Illinois were built to overcome the ridge and connect Lake Michigan to the Illinois River, and thus to the Mississippi River.

The first canal was the 96-mile-long Illinois and Michigan Canal. Work first began in 1836, however the Panic of 1837 delayed the work and the canal was not completed until 1848. The towpath canal was 60 feet wide and 6 feet deep, and ran between Peru on the Illinois River to Chicago on Lake Michigan. The canal used 17 locks to overcome the 140 feet in elevation change between the lake and river. Once over the ridge, the canal followed the valley of the Des Plaines and Illinois River to its western terminus near La Salle / Peru. It was here the boats could use the river to reach the Mississippi River. The I&M was used up to 1933 when it was superseded by the larger Sanitary Canal. The I&M was used to test the idea of reversing the flow of the Chicago River in 1871 when the canal was enlarged and the river made to flow south instead of toward the lake.

The 28-mile-long Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal was opened in 1900, with the main purpose to reverse the flow of the Chicago River and allow the pollution and waste of the city to flow south instead of to Lake Michigan where the city had it’s fresh water intakes. A secondary purpose was to create a new shipping route to replace the smaller I&M Canal.

The Sanitary and Ship Canal is a mix of canalized river navigation and dug channel. The route uses the South Branch Chicago River and then closely follows the route of the older I&M Canal running alongside the Des Plaines River to Lockport, where it joins with the river and becomes a canalized navigation. Two locks and dams create the navigation pools for the navigation. The channel is 202 feet wide and 24 feet deep.

The Chicago Area Waterway System (CAWS) is a network of canals in the greater Chicago area that serve sanitary and navigation purposes. It includes the Chicago Sanitary Canal, as well as the Chicago and Calument Rivers, the North Shore Channel, and the Cal-Sag (Calument-Saganashkee) Channel. In all, the system encompasses 87 miles of waterways. The official western end of the system is at Lockport.

The Illinois Waterway is a 336-mile-long waterway that uses the Illinois, Des Plaines, and CAWS waterways. The system is operated by the US Army Corps of Engineers. It has 8 locks and offers a 9 foot draft. This route continues to serve as an important route for freight, and it is part of the Great Loop, a route that makes it possible for recreational boaters to traverse the Great Lakes, Mississippi River, Gulf of Mexico, Intercoastal, and Erie Canals.

The Illinois and Mississippi Canal, also known as the Hennepin Canal, was built between 1892 and 1907. The canal was intended to create a safer and shorter route between the end of the I&M Canal just west of Peru on the Illinois River and the Mississippi River at Rock Island. By the time the canal was complete, the larger Chicago Sanitary Canal and enlarged locks along the Illinois River made the Hennepin obsolete before it was opened. The canal remained in use until 1951. Many of the canal building innovations used on the Hennepin were used in later canal construction projects such as the Chicago Sanitary and the New York State Barge Canal. The canal remains remarkably intact and is the central feature of the Hennepin Canal Parkway State Park.

At 325 miles in length, the Kaskaskia River is the second largest Illinois tributary to the Mississippi River. From it’s confluence with the Mississippi, the river is navigable for 35 miles upstream, with one lock controlling the navigation pool at Modoc.

CANAL GROUPS AND ORGANIZATIONS

The Illinois & Michigan Canal National Heritage Area is the first of its kind: a national park of communities, not federal land. Based around the I&M Canal, which connected the Illinois River to Lake Michigan creating an all-water, inland route from the East Coast to the Gulf of Mexico, our National Heritage Area is made up of 60 cities and towns, from Chicago to LaSalle-Peru, who owe their growth to the canal.

The Friends of the Hennepin Canal is a volunteer membership organization helping the Hennepin Canal Parkway State Park preserve and educate about the 104.5-mile-long canal which operated until 1951.

The Ottawa Canal Association is located in Ottawa, Illinois. Its mission is to educate about the I&M Canal where it passed through the city.

Major Repositories and Archives

Illinois State Archives- The Illinois and Michigan Canal– This site offers quite a nice history of canals in the US and a detailed history of the I&M Canal.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Digital Library has many resources available for study.

CANAL INDEX PAGES

The “canal index” project is an on-going project of the ACS to document canal sites. Most of the information is from the 1970-1990 time period, however new pages are being added. Feel free to contribute to this project by submitting a form.

Note: Canals in blue and underlined have index sheets which are accessible by double clicking on the hyperlink.

Please note that many of these are the actual pages done in the early 1970s.  Changes have occurred since and there are some inaccuracies in the information on the pages.

Revised 04/29/2022