News - The American Canal Society

Canal Genealogies

I am a family genealogist, and recently I was happy to inform my wife that Alfred Noble, the man who oversaw the construction of the Weitzel lock at Sault Ste. Marie, and was on the board that recommenced the use of locks on the Panama Canal (instead of digging a sea-level canal), was the nephew of the wife of her second great-grandfather. You can imagine her excitement when she said, “Who and who?”

This revelation came about as a happy accident due to my interest in creating family trees of the people who are my research topics. I like to use timelines when researching a topic or a person, and in the last few years, I have begun to construct simple genealogies for my main subject. Using my Ancestry.com subscription, I can create as many family trees as I want. As the family tree is developed and more info is added to a person’s profile, a very usable timeline is created, and then Ancestry suggests possible hints about records that can help add to the life story of my subject. In addition to all this, I can then upload and make available records and facts that might be usable to other genealogists.

So, over the years I have created a few canal engineer family trees and here are a few examples. These are in no way extensive, but hopefully show what else can be found by taking a deeper dive into the family tree.

The Gill family. If I say Gill, most will think of Edward Hall Gill, who worked on many canals including the Sandy and Beaver, Schuylkill, and James River and Kanawha. Edward was the son of Valentine Gill. Valentine had moved the family from Ireland to Nova Scotia in 1814 to work as a surveyor on the Shubenacadie Canal. While there, he wrote this letter to President Thomas Jefferson that can be found on the Library of Congress website;

“Sir, The eminence of your character, your philosophic and scientific genius and your ability to promote and reward merit, has prompted me to seek at Monticello, the retreat of its bountiful donor, that patronage, for want of which oft times fair science droops, and ability remains unnoticed and unrewarded; “And many’s the flower that’s doom’d to bloom unseen, And waste its fragrance on the desert air.” Your universal knowledge and love of science will plead the excuse for the intrusion of an adventurer, an exile of Erin, whose hopes there once flattering, is now without pain to be remembered no more, I have been regularly bred to the Engineer department, Surveying in its fullest extent, leveling and conducting Canals &c. My drawings of Maps Plans &c, will be found not inferior.

I was brought in here while on my way to your inviting shores, where I have been employed but not to the extent of my wishes, the first desire of my heart, is to become a resident of your land of liberty! as a friend to science and humanity, say can I hope for employment there; I have a small family companions of my adventurous fate, prudence forbids my leaving this without a Knowledge of where I should take them; with diffidence I humbly solicit this mark of your condescension, which should I be so fortunate to attain, my gratitude shall ever remain unabated, Your general knowledge of the country, and intimacy with its conductors might point out employment for me, at some of its public works, or your extensive domain would perhaps afford a field sufficient to found my introduction.

I have the Honor to be Sir, with every mark of Respect & esteem your most Obedient Honorable Servant &c,” (signed) Valentine Gill

There is no record if that letter resulted in any job prospects, but we do know that the family moved to New York in 1817 so Valentine could help survey the Erie Canal. Valentine is noted in canal history for his advocacy of the southern canal route that would have had a summit 90 feet higher then Lake Erie. (He lost and the canal took the northern route.) There is a mention of two children of a Valentine Gill who died when they fell into a cistern when the family lived in the Cooperstown area. He later moved to Rochester, NY, where he drafted a map that he said was compiled from “correct surveys.”

As noted, the well-known Edward Hall Gill was a noted engineer for many canals, apparently working on two canals at the same time. In 1980, the Pennsylvania Canal Society published an excellent bio of Edward Gill in their Canal Currents newsletter. Edward never had children, so few people actively research his life beyond his work.

A brother of Edward, Washington Gill, also went into the surveying and engineering trade. He often found work with his brother and then later as the first civil engineer of Richmond, Virginia. He later moved to St. Charles, Missouri, where he superintended the construction of the first bridge over the river at that place. Interestingly, it is said that Washington Roebling was named after Washington Gill.

The Whitford/Noble family- Anyone who has read any history on the Erie Canal has likely read a bit about Noble Whitford. Nobel wrote the two-volume 1905 state report that has become the “bible” of canal research. He later followed up with a 1922 history of the Barge Canal.

An interesting tidbit about Noble is that in one of his later in life interviews, he related how he and his sister narrowly escaped death in 1874 when the floor of the Central Baptist Church of Syracuse gave way during a strawberry festival that the two were attending. Many were killed and over 200 were injured.

Noble was the son of David Earl Whitford and Sarah Noble. David was also an engineer on New York’s canals. It was reported that David began his employment in 1853 as a “tape-man” in the Syracuse weighlock. David oversaw many projects during the enlargement of the Erie. He died in 1913, but we can say that he was able to witness all three canal eras of New York.

My interest was tweaked when I was rereading “The Path Between The Seas,” and was reminded of the American civil engineer Alfred Noble (not Alfred Nobel for who the Nobel Prize is named.) Of course this raised the question as to any possible connections between Alfred Noble and Noble Whitford, since the mother’s maiden name is often used for her children. Looking back over the generations, I found that both families came from Westfield, Massachusetts. From there it was simply a matter of how many generations back I would find the common ancestor. It turns out that Alfred Noble and David Whitford were of the same generation, although the grandfather they both share was some six generations removed!

However, in the research I saw that Alfred was from Livonia, Michigan. And, in one of his obituaries, I saw a mention of his close friend, Judge Edgar Durfee. This was indeed odd as I had researched Judge Durfee after my mother-in-law had asked me about her memories of a judge in her family from Michigan. As it turns out, Judge Durfee and Alfred Noble were first cousins, and as a result, my wife is a closer relation to Alfred than Noble Whitford was!

You can read more about Whitford in this post titled, Whitford on Whitford.

The Watt family- David A. Watt was one of the lead engineers on the New York State Barge Canal, and the designer of the Mohawk dams. But he found work on many river canalization projects around the country in the late 1800s. These include the Fox, Green, Big Sandy, Kentucky, and other rivers. He also co-authored “The Improvement of Rivers,” with Benjamin Franklin (B.F.) Thomas. He also oversaw the construction of the coffer dams around the battleship Maine in 1911 when the ship was being recovered from Havana harbor. David was born and trained in England and came to America with his family as one of the early settlers in St. Petersburg, Florida. His brother, John Marshall Watt, was also a civil engineer and worked on the Panama Canal. Like many of these engineers, David never had children.

In spite of being one of the later engineers, I have only found one photo of David in the Barge Canal Bulletin which is a bit of a puzzle as David was certainly a self promoter. However, he did leave his papers to the Florida Historical Society, and his accounts of camping and boating along the Gulf Coast were used for an article in 1980 by Kay Tapley. David and his wife Josephine Abercrombie left their home to the city and it is now Abercrombie Park in St. Petersburg.

Benjamin Franklin Thomas – Benjamin, or as he was always known, B.F., was the co-author of “The Improvement of Rivers,” with David Watt. Benjamin using “B.F.” might be the reason that David used D.A. as his name. Benjamin was 12 years older then David and likely a mentor. Both men worked in the Army Corps and were assigned to the work along the Big Sandy River in Kentucky. B.F. was the principal engineer for the dam and lock at Louisa, which was the first needle dam to be built in the states. Benjamin would remain as the engineer on the Big Sandy for years, unlike his protēgē who would travel extensively in his work. Benjamin was born in May 1853 in Ironton, Ohio, and died in Catlettsburg, Kentucky in 1923.

Both Benjamin and David were active promoters of the movable dam and many of the Chanoine wicket type dams that were built along the Ohio and other rivers was due to their influence.

The Hutchinson family- Holmes Hutchinson’s name is so entwined with the history of New York’s canals that he almost doesn’t need an introduction. His 1834 maps of the Erie are still used today to locate canal structures all across the state. He began work on the Erie in 1819, and he spent a majority of his life working on canals across the state. But, as with many of the engineers of the period, they went where the work was. In 1825, Holmes was employed as the Chief Engineer of the Connecticut River Company, and later he became involved with the construction of railroads to the point where he was named as president of the Oswego and Syracuse Railroad in 1851. He visited the Morris Canal in 1834 to study the inclined planes likely to study their possible use on the Black River Canal. His father, Amaziah, was a surveyor and helped to lay out many villages in the central New York area. In 1788, Amaziah plotted Owego, NY, and later moved to Union and then to Ithaca. He set up a ferry service across Cayuga Lake in 1802 near Genoa, which is where Holmes was born, before moving west to Dublin, Ohio.

Holmes lived in Utica and had a number of children, one of whom was Charles Webster Hutchinson. In 1875, Charles was elected mayor of Utica and then in 1876, became a founder of the Oneida County Historical Society.

The Schillner family- And, like Holmes Hutchinson and his maps, George Schillner is associated with his 1896 maps of the Erie Canal. But unlike the other folks I have researched, he was more a surveyor and draftsman, rather then being an engineer. So his time was mostly spent in the employ of the state working on various surveys and mapping projects. The Schillner family was part of the large German population who settled in the Utica and Rome regions of New York. Some of the family found early employment as boaters on the Erie before settling down for more permanent occupations in Utica. And, apparently the family had some musical abilities as they are often mentioned as part of the Rome Cornet Band and the Rome Musical Association.

A note for any genealogists out there. The trees I create are not up to the genealogical standards. These simple trees give me a sense of the lives lived and sometimes, a surprise such as a church collapse is found. I use what is available online and through Ancestry and Family Search. By creating the tree, I hope that others can use it as hints for their research, but as I caution, they need to be checking and holding to their own genealogical standards. They can be found on Ancestry.com.

A Dredge Roll Call – Contracts 60, 63, and 66.

The further west we go, the fewer dredges are seen as most of the digging took place in a dry environment with steam shovels and cable ways. Digging in the dry was better suited to the ladder dredge as the spoil could be used to build up banks or fill areas without all the wash water that was used in hydraulic dredges.

Contract 60 – The Mohawk Ladder Dredge

The ladder dredge Mohawk. Note the bank armoring in the foreground showing us that the channel was complete and that the dredge was either being used to deepen or fine tune the depth.

The ladders all worked with a belt conveyor that was attached to a separate and smaller barge. Note the sheet piling that is being used to help form the bank. The stone in the fore ground was likely used as a bank core.

The Mohawk in winter. Note the chain of buckets hanging from the boom.

Contract 60 – The Grapple Dredge

This un-named grapple used both a clam-shell bucket (top photo) and an orange-peel bucket (bottom). If you look close, you can see that the rig carried both buckets. This would have been used to conduct bank work and touch up areas along the canal.

Contract 63 – The Fairport All Electric Hydraulic Dredge

The Fairport was the only all electric dredge used during the construction of the Barge Canal.

The hull of the Fairport in the winter of 1911.

The crew takes time to pose for this photo. What we don’t see is how it is connected to the shore power.

The caption says that the boats are stalled, but not certain what this means. The second boat in the line is a steam-power canal boat and it looks to be pushing and towing the other two. Perhaps stalled due to low water?

Contract 66 – The Mineola Ladder Dredge

For some reason there are more images of the Mineola then of the Mohawk, but both operated in the same manner. A chain of buckets scooped up the spoil and then delivered that to the banks by way of floating belt conveyors.

We get a nice look at the floating monster that was the ladder dredge. These were used more in western gold mining operations then in canal construction, but they were used to construct the the Fox River navigation in Wisconsin.

We get a look at the operating environment.

Note the constructed channel ready to receive the spoils.

Canal Comments – Thornport and Navigation on the Licking Summit Reservoir by Terry K. Woods

Editors Note- We haven’t heard from Terry in a bit, so here is one where he introduces us to the failed navigation on the Licking Summit Reservoir.

Hi Guys:

Several columns ago we told the tale of the wreck of the Black Diamond. The fact that that vessel was following a “channel” through the Licking Summit Reservoir (Buckeye Lake) led us to look up that channel on the Internet. With an old county history unearthed from that source and some information from the southern Ohio Canal Historian, Dave Meyer, we pieced together the fact of a (for me) previously unknown canal. I hope this one will pique your interest.

THORNPORT and NAVIGATION ON THE LICKING SUMMIT RESERVOIR

This 1909 topo map shows both Thornport and Thornville at the end of Buckeye Lake. The Ohio and Erie Canal can be seen as a dashed blue line in the upper left corner passing through Hebron.

As soon as the Ohio Canal was completed through the state from Cleveland to West Portsmouth, residents of those towns, “just off the line” began searching for ways to get “into the action”. When the Licking Summit Reservoir was enlarged in 1839-40, the higher waters came to just over a mile from the small Perry County town of Thornville.

Efforts were immediately initiated to form a new town along the Reservoir’s edge and to devise a way to get canal boats from the Ohio Canal’s towpath that passed through the center of the enlarged reservoir to it’s southeastern edge, close to Thornville

When the initial reservoir had been constructed in the late 1820s, its waters had been impounded without clearing the walnut forests and brush before the water was let in. Walnut trees are slow to decay, so their carcasses and stumps were still a danger to any navigation of the reservoir itself. Over the years a number of Legislative Acts had been passed to clear the reservoir and make it passable for craft. Also, at some date prior to March of 1839 the Ohio State Legislature had authorized a sum of $6,000 to complete these various tasks. And, again, prior to March 1839, the Perry Improvement Company had been organized and given the task of improving navigation within the Licking Summit Reservoir.

Then, on March 16, 1839, an Act by the Ohio State Legislature changed the name of the Perry Improvement Company to that of the Licking Summit Reservoir Navigation Company and authorized them to receive the already authorized $6,000 to ‘improve’ navigation on the Licking Summit Reservoir, just as soon as officers and directors of the company had been appointed and at least $3,000 of stock was sold.

Probably in the same time frame, a town was initiated near the water’s edge of the reservoir a mile or so north-west of Thornville and was given the appellation of Thornport.^ⁱ A large hotel and warehouse were speedily constructed and quite a little town sprang up, ‘as if by magic’.

The Licking Summit Navigation Company cut a channel (boatway) through the eastern port of the reservoir from the feeder (“Hole in the Wall”) some three miles north-east of Millersport on the Ohio Canal to Thornport on the south-east extremity of the reservoir. A two-horse, tread-wheel boat was to tow canal boats to and from Thornport along this cleared channel through the stumps, logs and snags of the reservoir.

According to Colburn’s History of Perry County, “Things went on swimmingly for a season or so and the strange craft plied regularly between Thornport and the Feeder on the Ohio Canal. carrying out the surplus grain products of the township and returning with salt, groceries, hardware, dry goods, and other commodes.”

We know from the wreck of the BLACK DIAMOND (CC No. 100) that, by the boating season of 1850, though the Thornport Channel may have been passable if the steersman stayed in it, there was certainly no towboat in evidence. So, just what happened to the grand plan of the promoters of the Licking Summit Reservoir Navigation Company?

First, there appears to have been a considerable amount of dissension between the president and two directors of the navigation company and many of the stockholders. As early as January 24, 1843, a number of the latter, asked the State Legislature to examine the books and financial transactions of the company. The State appointed a three-man committee to do so, but stated that, first, the complainants must post a financial bond to pay for the examination. Nothing was apparently done about that complaint. So, apparently, by 1843, some stockholders of the navigation company at least, were not receiving the dividends they had expected.

Going back to Colburn may give us a reason why they were not, “One day a short flotilla of canal boats was being towed slowly across the delightful, placid waters and all the earth and sky apparently as lovely and serene as the blue waters of the reservoir itself. A storm suddenly loomed up in the northwestern sky; and almost in a twinkling rain decended in torrents, forked lightenings flashed, and the thunder rolled and jarred until even the large catfish at the bottom of the lake were stunned. Worse than all for the hardy seafarers, the winds blew a fearful hurricane. The waves of the agitated lake tossed and rolled around as fearful as the waters of the Atlantic in mid-ocean. There could be but one result. The frail fleet was not prepared to weather such a gale, and the whole concern was wrecked, the boatmen thankful that they escaped a watery grave.

“It is probable that the boatmen who encountered this “storm at sea” carried exaggerated reports of it to the men of the Ohio Canal. It is certain that no Captain of men would venture out into that shallow reservoir again. Thus, ingloriously, ended the inland navigation of Thorn Township”

The men who wrote county histories in the 1880s invariably did their research in the memories of the resident “old-timers”. Often these tales, told by an oldster to a young, gullible reporter, were more fanciful than factual.

Going back to dry, State records we find that on January 15, 1851, probably less than six months after the wreck of the BLACK DIAMOND, a petition signed by 225 stockholders of the Licking Summit Reservoir Navigation Company were again asking the State Legislature to look into the dealings of the company. The petition complained that the president and two directors were running the company with no input from the stockholders. They also stated that, “. . .near nineteen years has passed since the completion of this Improvement during which time an immense amount of freight was carried to and from the Ohio Canal. It has now become so filled up and overgrown with vegetation that it is with the greatest difficulty that boats can pass, with 1/4 freight through the channel. Your petitioners are well aware that there are twice the amount of funds in the hands of the president and directors to put the channel in the best navigable order, and to keep a towboat in readiness.”

Obviously someone’s arithmetic is off. Nineteen years before 1851 would have been 1832. The enlargement of the reservoir wasn’t even begun until 1837. We’re guessing the channel improvement was completed in 1842 or ‘43. We are also guessing that the tread-mill tow-boat was never more than a gleam in a navigation company director’s eye at one time.

It seems probable that, when the channel was dug, the spoil was thrown up onto the north embankment of the reservoir to form a crude towpath. That the channel was still known and being used in 1850 can be proven by the one successful voyage and the second disastrous one of the BLACK DIAMOND in 1850. That the stockholders were not getting many, if any, dividends is obvious. But that is probably more to it not being a very profitable operation rather than deceitful management.

So, how much longer than 1850 was that channel available? I don’t know. Perhaps some industrious historian from that area knows, or can find out and will tell us.

In the meantime, we can learn from Colburn that a railroad was begun through Thornport in 1853, but never completed. There wasn’t a successful railroad through that village until 1871, but other railroads in the vicinity probably took most of the grain shipments away from the reservoir navigation before the 1860s took a good hold.

i History of Fairfield and Perry Counties, E. S. Colburn, 1883.

The Prism Newsletter of the Blackstone Canal Conservancy

In addition to being the past president of the American Canal Society and author, David Barber was also the man behind the Blackstone Canal Conservancy. In his computer files, I found the following issues of The Prism which was the newsletter of the Conservancy. I tried looking this up and can’t find any current mention of the publication on the web. As these start with issue 45, June 2014, and go up through his death with issue 56, December 2016, there had to be another 44 issues out there.

I found the Blackstone Canal Conservancy on the Wayback Machine at www.blackstonecc.org. Sadly, the links no longer work.

Issue 45 June 2014 Issue 48 December 2014 Issue 49 January 2015

Issue 50 March 2015 Issue 51 July 2015 Issue 52 October 2015

Issue 53 November 2015 Issue 54 April 2016 Issue 55 July 2016

Issue 56 December 2016

Book Review – The Reservoir War

The Reservoir War; A History of Ohio’s Forgotten Riot in America’s Gilded Age, 1874-1888

By Jerett W. Godeke, 2023, 426 pages.

During the canal era in North America, hundreds of large and small reservoirs were constructed in order to supply the thousands of miles of the nation’s canals with a steady supply of water. As the canals were abandoned after the glow of the canal era dulled a bit, many were repurposed as water supplies for nearby communities, for recreation, and/or for flood control. In some cases, the land that the reservoir sat on was deemed more valuable then the water and they were drained and the land sold off. The process of abandonment could be contentious as the pro-canal forces battled to save the canal infrastructure while the anti-canal forces fought to hasten the process. The Reservoir War details one such battle along the Wabash and Erie Canal in western Ohio.

Let me congratulate Mr. Godeke on the well-researched book that details this “war” over a small, and sometimes lacking water, reservoir. In his introduction, he outlines how he was able to do much research on this topic from his home. In this new world of digital newspapers, Google Books, Hatfi-Trust, and so on, new avenues of research are opening up that allow the present-day historian access to resources that would have been locked away just a decade ago. A simple Boolean query can help to discoverer facts tucked away in far away and often, hidden collections. This book is a testament to what can be done from one’s den.

Although the Wabash and Erie was largely an Indiana canal, a short section was located in western Ohio between the settlement of Junction and the Ohio/Indiana border. Once the W&E was abandoned by the state of Indiana in 1874, the residents and businesses along the short section of canal that remained in Ohio had to decide what to do with their dead-end spur. That section of canal, along with the reservoir, make up the battlefield for the war. As the author notes in his introduction, to call this a war is a stretch at best, but as heavy explosives were used and the military called in the restore order, the term does fit.

At the core of the story is a small canal reservoir that was built just east of Antwerp, Ohio, along the Wabash and Erie Canal. If I understand the layout, the reservoir was built to collect excess water flowing down the canal from Indiana, holding it for dryer periods, basically like a water conservation side pond on a lock. When Indiana abandoned the canal, the water flow was cut off, leaving the reservoir resupply to local streams and runoff. In the wet times of the year, the reservoir might fill and in the dry periods, it would be more a swamp or wetland. The canal itself was a dead-end spur, used only by local folks to transport logs to mills further downstream. The stagnant water and “swamp gas” in the reservoir and canal were often blamed for illness, and the local population was convinced that the reservoir was worth more as farm land then for any water supply. In the end, local “dynamiters” took matters into their own hands and sought to breach the reservoir banks, and dry the land.

Godeke takes you through the entire life of the reservoir and the legal and physical struggles that would decide it’s future. You will not be left wanting for information as this is a deep dive on a rather bland subject. Let’s be honest here, it is a small reservoir that even when breached did not result in any heavy flooding of the surrounding landscape. What is surprising is the sheer amount of information that was written about the subject as the local pro and con newspapers fought their own war of words. And, not surprising, there are parallels to modern day events that the author leaves to the reader to contemplate and connect. But, there were a couple of times where I found myself going “wow!”

My main criticism of the book is the complete lack of any maps, diagrams, profiles, or any illustrations at all. In my experience, canal folks are map lovers and we all enjoy a historic canal map to help us “see” what is going on as we read along. It is not that the author didn’t consult these sources as he often mentions them and even gives the locations in regards to the present day. However, I would have greatly enjoyed the addition of maps to help me understand where the reservoir was built, why it was put there in relation to the canals, where the locks were located, and so on. Even a simple profile of the two canals, and how the reservoir was, or wasn’t, a benefit, would have helped. In short, any visual aid would have been much appreciated. If space was an issue, the citations could have been tightened up a bit to allow room.

From the 1914 topo map. The reservoir was located on lot 36, east of Antwerp. The canal is shown as the dashed blue line.

I also found the authors constant use of money conversions from 1880s to the present day valuations a tad annoying. Each time a dollar amount was given, he added the present day value, which after the first two, three or ten times, was a bit too much information. But those are minor annoyances when compared to the book as a total. And, with over 79 pages of citations and seven appendixes that total 50 pages, the reader will not be left wanting for facts.

The ACS Canal Boat Index of 1993

In the files of the American Canal Society archives I came across this Canal Boat Construction Index from 1993. At that time, the society was actively promoting the building of “authentic” canal boats in places where parks had decided to add a boat ride to their historic canal.

It is a bit of a wonky document, basically a finders guide to places where canal boat details might be gleaned, where models resided, and who (at that time) was operating or building boats. If you happen to be looking for archive materials about boats, this might be of help. It even includes the lock sizes.

It is an 11-page pdf file.

The Chignecto Ship Railway – 1973

This is something that has been kicking around the desk for a bit and I decided just to post it as I have it. In 1973, Donald Ramsey made a visit to Nova Scotia and was informed of this historic site, which he then documented and then asked for more information.

So here are the letters and photos. Unfortunately, the photos were taped to sheets of paper with some descriptions, but mostly, “engine foundation, brick wall…” etc. And, back in those days, one just snapped a couple photos and taped them together for a wide-angle view. The tape has long since dried out and the photos were all in a jumble. So I stitched together what looked right.

Book Review – Hennepin Canal Parkway: History Through the Miles

Hennepin Canal Parkway: History Through the Miles, by Barton Jennings, 2020, 404 pages.

One day I was searching though the American Canal Society archives looking for book or two about the history of the Illinois and Mississippi Canal, otherwise known as the Hennepin, and, to my surprise, I found very little. So I went looking for a book that would fill that need.

The 75-mile-long Hennepin was an extension of the older Illinois and Michigan, offering a route between the western end of the I&M and the Mississippi River at Rock Island. Although the canal had been proposed for decades, construction didn’t begin until 1892 and it wasn’t completed until 1907. By the time the route was ready, the larger Illinois Waterway and Chicago Sanitary Canals had been built, making the smaller Hennepin redundant. However, it remained in operation until 1951. With this late closing date, the canal remains very intact and it is now part of the Hennepin Parkway State Park.

The Hennepin was a canal of firsts. It was the first canal in America to be built completely with Portland Cement instead of cut stone locks. It was a test bed for heavy machinery that was just coming into its own such as the steam shovel and cable way. However, the locks were hand operated, and a towing path was built and maintained, but never used to tow a boat. This made the canal a unique mix of the old and new. And we can see how the materials, tools, techniques and machines first used in the construction of the Hennepin would be used on larger projects in the near future. Although Mr. Jennings doesn’t mention it, the Chicago Sanitary, the New York State Barge Canal, and the Soulanges Canal in Quebec, all have tie ins with the work done on this canal. Mr. Jennings does mention the Panama Canal, which greatly benefited from all these projects.

Barton Jennings offers a very readable history and field guide to the canal and the parkway, which includes the main canal and the 29-mile-long feeder. His book offers a mile-by-mile description of what you will see and encounter along the trail, but in a very enjoyable format. The author bios states that Mr. Jennings is a professor of supply chain management and also taught transportation operations. His experience as a teacher certainly shows in his style of writing where he covers the basics for the casual park user, but he also gives those of us who want them the added details that historians love to see.

The book begins with a 50-page history of the canal, beginning in 1834 and working up through the construction in the late 1800s and early 1900s. Then he begins his tour narrative at mile 0.00 at the eastern end. It is nice to see that the history lesson continues through each mile, and this makes for very informative reading. In each mile he explains in some detail what you are seeing, what was once there (if a structure has been replaced or modified), and why it is there. For instance, a bridge is described as a “Warren pony truss span with two 21-foot I-beam approach spans,” instead of simply saying a bridge, which makes the bridge geek in me very happy. To be sure, for those who don’t give a hoot about the history or infrastructure, this additional information will be passed over, while those who want to know are not left with unanswered questions.

I became interested in the Hennepin as I was researching the NYS Barge Canal construction machinery series, as the Hennepin and the Chicago Sanitary were both test beds of innovation for a lot of the machinery that was used on the New York Barge Canal. So I was delighted to see Mr. Jennings include sections such as, “The Battle of Cecil’s Slough,” where the canal had to be cut through the soft ground at mile 19. In order to deal with the muck, Lidgerwood cableways were constructed with two towers, one on each bank and a cable suspended between them. From this cable, a bucket would be used to remove the mucky soil, going where other machines could not. Mr. Jennings gives these machines their due to the point of including a short history of the company and showing a drawing of the rig. The book is full of little historical tidbits like this which makes it fun to read, even from a thousand miles away.

The book contains many photographs, drawings and maps. There is no index of the illustrations, but as almost every page has one, I would say that there are well over 200, if not many more. The format is 8.5 by 5.5 inches, and all the illustrations are in black and white. In addition, each photo, map and drawing includes a full citation, and Mr. Jennings offers additional reading sources for those who really want to dig deep into the history of the Hennepin Canal.

Mr. Jennings is to be congratulated for his engaging and very informative book.

Terry K. Woods’ Canal Comments – A 2010 Return to the Sugar Creek Crossing Site

I am going to detail a hike I took in January of 2010 to the Sugar Creek Crossing below Dover. I believe this is sort of timely. Members of the Canal Society of Ohio (CSO) and Stark Parks are sitting down to discuss the identity, location and status of the canal artifacts in Stark County that need to be preserved, restored or signed.

One artifact that I believe needs to be preserved (before it falls down) is the Big Sluice to the north of the Stark Parks Craig-Pittman Trailhead just south of Navarre. There are only three of those big sluices that I am aware of on the northern division of the Ohio Canal. Today’s column mentions the second one and it’s fate. I’d like to see something done with the one in Navarre to see that it doesn’t suffer the same.

THE SUGAR CREEK CROSSING (in 2010)^ⁱ

The Ohio and Erie Canal crossed Sugar Creek in slack-water above a dam just south of (now) Dover Ohio. It was a fascinating place and sported a long wooden crib dam, stone dam abutments and a large basin. A guard lock was constructed about a half mile below the crossing and a short sidecut, outlet lock and a refurbished mill dam allowed boats to exit the Ohio Canal, cross the Tuscarawas River and enter the New Philadelphia Lateral Canal through a guard lock.

This is a slide of a postcard showing the crossing at Sugar Creek.

I was shown all this in the early 1970s by my long-time class mate and canal buddy, Richard Williams. He is the same fellow who took me canal hunting in his Piper Apache in the early ‘70s.

The early 1900s attempted rebuild of this division of the Ohio Canal, reduced the size of the basin a bit, replaced the upper stone dam abutment with a concrete big sluice, removed the guard lock, and rebuilt the dam.

This is another slide copy of a postcard.

And by the time I first saw this area, the dam was gone, but any number of very interesting artifacts remained. I went into this area many times and the CSO toured the area in the mid-’80s. Then, the plastics company that owned the area sold to a larger concern and access to this fascinating area was denied.

I had sent a letter to Arizona Chemical in mid December of 2009 asking for permission to get onto their water treatment facility property and check out the remains of the crossing. I received a phone call from a Paul XXXXXXX, the head of Human Resources, and he had me get in contact with a Randy XXXXXXX, who would escort me around the property. I called Randy after the holidays and we agreed to wait until there was a lull in the snowfall. I called him back on January 20th. We set an appointment up for the next day, the 21st. for 10:00am.

I got to the water treatment plant off of State Route 39 about 9:30 and Randy rolled up in his truck about 10:10. He invited me into the truck, so I got my 35mm camera and two throw-away cameras and got in. We drove down an old roadway that was in the canal bed. After about 250 yards, the “roadway” stopped and we got out to continue on foot. There was no longer a real trail, but I knew the artifacts were on the track of a power line so we kept going in a general direction toward Sugar Creek. Finally, after turning to my right a bit, I walked across a slight ridge of maybe 10” to 12” with small stone strewn along it and knew that we had crossed the line of the dam. Old photos of the dam show it to have been some 4 to 5 feet high, stepped, and maybe 200 yards long. ^ⁱⁱ It had evidently been a wooden crib dam. The wood had apparently long ago rotted away and most of the stone in the cribbing had been washed away. Now there is only this slight ridge going in sort of a straight line.

The concrete sluice as seen in 2010. Terry Woods collection.

I figured we had passed the lower dam abutment, so turned to my right and soon came upon it. From this side it is a rather unimpressive stone structure. It is only a dam abutment, however, so doesn’t have a great deal of substance. I was much more impressed with stumbling across it back in the ‘70s from the other direction. I took a couple of photos and slides then we turned to go in the other direction for a look at the other abutment.

I saw sort of a shallow channel with some stone lining along each edge, not too wide, maybe six feet, that may have been the main run-off channel over the dam. Randy spied the other abutment. This abutment was a large concrete sluice that had been part of the early 1900s rebuild. When I was last in here in the early to mid-’80s I had noticed that one corner of this sluice was in a flood channel that had exposed maybe 18” of the wooden pilings. I thought then that this entire structure was in danger of falling over. One section has. It has fallen in toward the main structure. The rest of the rather nice large sluice is still intact, however. The flood channel was running deep and swift making it impossible to get onto the towpath or examine the canal at the creek’s edge. There were the remains of an old wasteway teetering on the edge of the creek when I was last in here and some sort of concrete-filled pipe sticking out of the creek bed. We couldn’t get into that area this trip to check it out.

Although a poor copy, you can see the concrete sluice at the end of the bridge.

I took a number of photos and slides from various angles then turned and took a couple of the dam ridge with the stone structure in the background. There had been a culvert on either side of the slack-water basin to carry runoff back to the river. I looked around a bit for the one on the lower side of the basin, but couldn’t find anything. Back in the ‘80s it was crushed in with the hulk of a 55 Plymouth on top. I didn’t see any Plymouth this time.

Another angle of the sluice as it was in 2010. Terry Woods collection.

We walked a bit toward the river and returned to the truck along a waste-treatment line that had been cleared. It made the trip back to the truck fairly easy. I asked Randy if we could get permission to bring 20 to 25 people in on the April 26 hike. I thought it might make a fun outing for serious folk, but probably isn’t enough to see for the current crowd of CSO tour people. Randy said he would check, but he didn’t sound that confident.^ⁱⁱⁱ

I thanked Randy and gave him a signed copy of my latest book. He had been very friendly and cooperative and asked many intelligent questions about the operation of the artifacts here at the crossing.

I got back in the car and continued on route 39 until it crossed the river, then turned into the old Delphia Motor Inn/Days Inn/Hartford Inn. I drove to its rear and parked along the fence-lined river. The fence began just a short distance to my left so I went around it and walked up along the left bank of the river. I had one throwaway camera and the 35mm camera. I spied the old dam abutment on the right bank of the river about 50 to 75 yards above where the fence started. The abutment was originally to the Baker’s Mill and later for the New Philadelphia Lateral Canal. The dam abutment is easy to see as it is just at the point where the river has broken into the Route 77 “borrow pits”. This would be an easy walk some evening of the tour to let people see an artifact that is readily visible, but one not many people know about. I took a couple of photos and slides, then got back into the car. When I was last in here (1997) there was some stonework also on the left bank. I didn’t scramble down to the river to look (getting way too old for that) and the river was so high, that much of it was probably under water. What was visible on the right bank was a right angle stone support to the old dam.

I then headed for home. I got off at the Strasburg exit and stopped at the Magic Hobby Shop, but didn’t see anything I wanted. I then turned right on 212 and stopped at the Stark Parks Trail Head. Their mailings state they are working on the trail near here. There is a quantity of gravel and fines at the trail head and a parked Green-Frog Dump Truck, but I didn’t see any evidence of a new trail branching off from this trail head.^{^iv}

I got back home shortly before Noon. A pretty worthwhile hike from a personal standpoint, but no public access was obtained. I hope we can do something in the future to make sure that the fate of the Big Sluice below Navarre does not follow that of the one down below Dover.

i From notes made of a hike taken on January 21, 2010.

ii That’s what my notes say, but I think it was closer to 75 or 100 yards long.

iii We didn’t receive permission.

iv The new trail branches off some distance to the north and follows the berm bank of the canal to the

aqueduct site.

Terry K. Woods’ Canal Comments – The Sugar Creek Crossing

Terry begins with;

Hi Guys:

One of the perks of wring this column, with no editors and no publishers, is that I get to write what I want the way I want it. That is also one of the downsides. I have no one to make sure I write a good one.

This column was supposed to be a straight historical description of the Sugar Creek Crossing just below Canal Dover. Instead, it reads more like, “How a spent several summer vacations”. Anyway, here it is. Hope you like it.

THE SUGAR CREEK CROSSING

In the 306+ miles of canal between Lake Erie to the Ohio River, the Ohio Canal crossed over various streams fourteen times using an aqueduct, and eight times in a slack-water pool built up behind a dam^ⁱ. While an aqueduct is an imposing structure and slack-water pools are probably not considered such, the slack-water crossing of Sugar Creek below Canal Dover on the Ohio Canal has always held a particular fascination for many an avid canal buff.

The dam, itself, is described rather tersely in the Canal Commissioner’s Report for the year 1832.

“Ninety-Three miles south of Cleveland the Ohio Canal crosses Sugar Creek, a major tributary of the Tuscarawas River in the pool of a dam, this dam is constructed of a double row of closely spaced pilings, filled between the rows with stone, and brush, and gravel, and covered with plank, laid upon plates resting upon and secured to the heads of each row of piles with an extensive apron of hewn timber and abutments of cut stone founded upon bearing piles, the waters of the stream may consequently be commanded for the use of the canal, but the supply of water furnished by the feeder at Zoar is so abundant that it has been found unnecessary to appropriate any part of them to the purpose of navigation.”

1875 map of Canal Dover from the Everts Combination Atlas Map of Tuscarawas County.

I was first shown the remains of the Sugar Creek Crossing in 1967 by an avid canal buff named Richard Williams. Richard had a plane and several times we went “canal looking” from the air. I’ve had at least one column on these trips. This time though, we scrambled through barriers of high, thick brush to find the actual site. I was into that site several times again during the 1980s and ‘70s.

The crossing had been updated during the 1908-09 rebuild and the northern stone dam abutment replaced with a large concrete sluice (similar to the one in the canal towpath in the Craig-Pittman Trailhead just south of Navarre). In its most recent iteration, the dam was paced off to be some 50 to 60 yards long. That new Sugar Creek Dam and Sluice was constructed in 1909 (contract let on Oct 13, 1908) by Clark and Meldy for $5,761.71.

Apparently, the dam remained as a ‘refurbished’ wood-crib structure as little more than a raised line of fine stone marked it’s former location when I searched for it. The first time I was in that area alone and rediscovered the one remaining stone dam abutment, I approached it from the creek side and was quite impressed with the find.

A guard lock was located some 2,300 feet below the dam. It raised northbound boats to the momentary level of the slack-water crossing and protected the lower canal from high water, but it was, apparently, removed during the 1900s rebuild of the dam and crossing.

It took me quite a while to determine why the guard lock was so far below the slack-water crossing. Then, while perusing some Board of Public Works Reports, I ran across an item mentioning the need to repair the outlet lock for the New Philadelphia Lateral Canal. That sidecut exited the Ohio Canal just above the guard lock above a rebuild of the old Baker Mill Dam. The guard lock was required to be so far away from the crossing so that the Lateral could exit the main canal in the Sugar Creek slack-water level

In 1976, Don Baker, a reporter from the New Philadelphia Times-Reporter asked me to guide him to each of the remaining canal structures in Tuscarawas County for a Sunday Supplement segment he was preparing. We did this run in the month of July, and foliage was very high, almost too high, to get into the sites, let alone take coherent color photos, but the resulting Sunday piece was a good one.

1977 visit to the site. Terry Woods collection.

The Sugar Creek Crossing was one of those sites. The Union Camp Chemical Company was then occupying the entire area containing the crossing artifacts and had constructed some sort of processing plant and a cooling-water pond near the southern property line. The plant was vacant except for one security personnel the hot Sunday afternoon we made our journey and he was more than happy to relieve the tedium by showing us around. I gained a ‘perk’ by picking his brain concerning the New Philadelphia Lateral Canal which this security guard had swam in during his boyhood.

In 1982, Ted Kasper and I led a Canal Society of Ohio tour of Tuscarawas County. Ted gained the friendship of a gentleman from New Philadelphia whose name I no longer remember, but happened to be the Public Relations Director for the Union Camp Chemical Company. This man gave us complete freedom to visit the canal artifacts adjacent to the chemical company. Naturally, it was a high point of the tour.

I spent a great deal of time scouring that area in preparation for the tour. I came in through the chemical plant access road many times and once I even came in along the railroad tracks from the north, but couldn’t get onto the actual dam site from that direction as Sugar Creek was flowing strong and wide across my path. After the 1913 flood had destroyed the dam, the creek cut a new channel just to the north of the “new” concrete sluice.

During those last few visits onto the site I discovered that, during flood times, the creek was undercutting one wall of the sluice. At least 18” of the supporting wooden pilings were exposed. I was fearful that half of that concrete structure might soon collapse.

The rebuild had included concrete waste-ways about 30 yards before and after the dam, plus culverts to carry any surplus rain water away from the structure into the near-by Tuscarawas River. During one of my trips there in the ‘80s I discovered a wrecked 1955 Plymouth lying in the south culvert access ditch.

That whole area has been closed to the general public since the late ‘80s. Unfortunately, I may have been the cause of that censure. Shortly after the tour, I wrote to the head of the chemical plant suggesting that the company and the Canal Society of Ohio work together to get that area north of their plant declared a National Historic Landmark. Apparently, the company officials felt any such designation might jeopardize their work area and the Sugar Creek Slack-water Crossing was closed off. For that I am truly sorry.

I did get into that area one more time. In December of 2009 I wrote to the chemical company asking for permission to explore the area. The CSO was again planning a tour of Tuscarawas County and I wanted to include that area. On January 10, 2010, I was escorted around the area by a company official. He was quite gracious and let me see whatever I wanted to see, but access for the tour was denied. I took notes of that last excursion and may use it as a column in the near future.

i A GLOSSARY OF TERMS of the Ohio & Erie Canal, Terry K. Woods, KENT STATE UNIVERSITY PRESS, 2008.