Thank you for posting your stories here on my blog. I'm certain we will all enjoy reading each others adventures along the canal.
Jeff Maximovich
The Johnny Apple Seed of the Ohio & Erie Canal
Certain stories are subject to ALL RIGHTS RESERVED which will be acknowledged at the beginning of the story. No part of a specific story may be produced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission of the author except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed in a newspaper, magazine or journal. Any stories which fall under the terms listed, are not to be used for cinematic purposes without permission.
The Johnny Apple Seed of the Ohio & Erie Canal
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2,142 comments:
«Oldest ‹Older 1201 – 1400 of 2142 Newer› Newest»1357-There wasn't much of a profitable margin to work with in 1906 with only a handful of canal boats left afloat on the Miami and Erie Canal.
1359-To Troy, I think you should follow up and research the historical archives as suggested before stating facts which are leaning towards fiction. Take my advice and search out the truth, it's out there and then post.
1360
#1357- I do not have a Public works report covering 1906 but I do have one covering 1905. In that year,the Miami and Erie had toll receipts (that means boat tolls) of $4037, the Ohio and Erie-$2806.
To carry this argument further. Total revenue,including water,pipe, and land leases/rentals- The Miami and Erie $100,000.00, the Ohio and Erie $43,000.00. Neither showed a "profitable" margin after expenses, but one showed that it still clearly had more boat traffic and more potential.
1361
To 1360- I couldn't have stated your case any better. The M&E was the breadwinner of the 2 mainline canals in the post lessee period. I could be accused of being biased in that opinion but numbers don't lie as they say.
Don't be put-off by some of the less informed opinions that find there way onto this blog.-W.A.Seed
1362 Selling water for hydraulic purposes is a far cry form moving cargo. There were only a handful of boats in the year of 1900. What I absorbed after reading the reports is nothing less than expanded numbers strumpet up for some to retain job positions within the Canal Commission. I'm quite aware of the canal reports and try not to have too much retention by what they claim. I work with factual situations within a specific time era. Where were the canal boats then??? Let's forget about having to sell of water for power at a measly profit, could the boats alone pay the duty?
Troy
1363-you know, "jack and the beanstalk" is a good book, filled with fiction, I find the canal reports just as full of fictionous fabrications. How can one assume that reports weren't altered to look extravagant un-coupled from the truth??? Let it be known, the Miami and Erie was a complete failure!!! You still haven't provided the names of any boats running in 1900......
Troy
1364
I'm not going to waste my time digging up boat names since you will likely reply that I have made them up. With little more than $4000.00 in toll receipts, there were not many boats left on the canal. My point-with $2800.00 in receipts, the Ohio and Erie had even fewer.
As far as I am concerned this debate is over. Declare yourself the winner so you can resume reading Jack and the Beanstalk.
1365-Here lies an interesting fact. After the railroads successfully nearly wiped out the canal shipping industry here in Ohio and in our connecting states, they did what was predicted, the railroads upped the freight charges. The manufacturers and industry along the canals began looking up and down the canal without any luck finding boats, that when active, were reasonable haulers. Sometime during the 1880s, a congressional act was passed to take control, holding back the skyrocketing rates imposed by the railways. It cost more to move coal via rail than the initial cost of the material until congress stepped in.
1366
Carolyn raises a good point. If the state had made the the investment, upgrading one of the two mainline canals in the 1880s or 90s like New York state had (a couple of times) one of the two would have generated a positive cash flow into the 1950's & provided competion to the railroads. I know that the federal government comissioned some studies on this topic but I've not read them & can only speculate as to why nothing ever came of it. As said before, I'm biased towards the M&E and think that canalizing the Maumee river & the Great Miami with a wider, deeper canal in between is the logical choice but I'd be interested in a rational, polite debate as to why the O&E would have been a better choice.-W.A.Seed
1367
1366-My opinion would be that the Ohio and Erie Canal could provide a shorter route to the Ohio River by way of Dresden Junction. Widening the Maumee and Great Miami rivers to accept heavy barge traffic seems practical to service the state’s western end that includes the Indiana canal systems. That wouldn’t do the state’s eastern end much good with it having an abundance of heavy industry located along the shores of Lake Erie and a hundred miles inland tying into the Ohio and Erie Canal. Hypothetically, by widening the Ohio and Erie Canal, versus the Miami and Erie Canal would have its downfalls as well because the P&O with the Sandy & Beaver Canal connections had already expired and were out of service. The mills of Pittsburgh by then had adapted well to moving its steel, ore, coal and coke using the Ohio River. By the time the 20th century arrived, the Ohio and Erie Canal was a system all to itself without anymore canal connections. But even with its glory days in the rears and its lackluster, I still feel as if it would be the choice of canals to re-invent as a new interstate barge canal and shortcut from the Great Lakes to the Ohio River at Marietta. Marietta would be enhanced and become a major port for the Ohio and Erie Canal coupled with the Ohio River. Making that connection, technically puts the major mills of Cleveland and Pittsburgh on a direct route with the outside world, eliminating Cleveland and the other major Great Lakes shippers from having to use the St. Lawrence to the Atlantic when the Ohio and Erie Canal was operational and an option, but one could argue the same for using the Miami and Erie Canal connection with the Ohio River at Cincinnati.
1368 - 1365-To Carolyn--As the United States continued to industrialize in the second half of the nineteenth century, Americans became more and more concerned about the unfair competition created by monopolies. In particular, railroads were able to control their markets and manipulate rates to their own advantage. A number of states, including Ohio, had unsuccessfully attempted to regulate railroads before 1887. Ohio had created a state commission to report on railroad and telegraph rates as early as 1867, but this commission did not have any authority to change rates or to order the railroad companies to change their policies.
As a result of the failure of states to regulate railroads, the United States Congress passed the Interstate Commerce Act in 1887. The Interstate Commerce Act required that railroads charge fair rates to their customers and make those rates public. This legislation also created the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC), which had the authority to investigate and prosecute companies who violated the law. Unfortunately, the Interstate Commerce Commission also faced limitations during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The commission was only authorized to investigate companies whose business crossed over state lines. If the railroad only operated within one state, the Interstate Commerce Commission did not have any authority over it. The commission also found that the courts usually ruled in favor of the companies when cases were prosecuted. A total of sixteen cases made their way before the United States Supreme Court between 1887 and 1906, and the court only upheld the commission's decision in one of those cases.
1369--This passage has no bearing on the canal systems of Ohio, but interesting to say the least. During the excavation of the new Cleveland Stadium a burial site was un-earthed finding several skulls and assortments of bones and ancient Indian artifacts. The Indian affairs counsel was notified and upon arrival all the entire sub-structure had been cleared and dumped into Lake Erie far from shore. The mayor then Voinovich was part of the cover up who further denied all entry for the Indians to promote their own investigation, concrete was poured covering any further evidence.
1370- Which canal system was accompanied by an electric mule?
1371- I go under trivia guy and seldom frequent this site. I posted 1370 only because I wanted to bring out the attention that the Miami & Erie Canal was receiving in the early 20th century. I haven't found anything in the works to promote the Ohio & Erie within the same era.
In July 1900, the well-known attorney of Cincinnati, Powell Crosley, applied for a lease of the canal's berm bank (the side opposite the towpath) from Cincinnati to Toledo for electric railway purposes to join the Cincinnati and Toledo lines. In October 1900, Thomas N. Fordyce of Detroit was to arrange a contract with the Westinghouse Electric Co. for electrical machinery and supplies to cost $600,000 for the equipment of an electrical railroad from Cincinnati to Lake Erie, a distance of 244 miles. The proposed plan was to construct a standard gauge railroad on the bank of the canal, and upon it run electric motors which, instead of hauling cars upon the rails, would haul long strings of boats in the canal - thus the name "Electric Mule."
1372
To 1367- Jeff, you make a compelling case for the Ohio & Erie. That idea directly reflects what the state decided on after 1907 when they refurbished most existing canal structures from Cleveland to Dresden. When Ohio financed that and their hodgepodge renovations on the entire Miami & Erie in 1905-1909 it's my opinion that they could have concentrated the money on just one of the two. In your plan approx 160 miles of direct widening & deepening would have been required while mine would have been less than 100 + deepening of the two river channels. A source of water could present a problem to both routes.
To 1371
I'm pleased that Trivia guy mentioned the Electric mule on the M&E. It did get built from Cincinnati to just south of Middletown. Unfortunately it resulted in much canal bank damage & financial losses for its bondholders. This scheme ended after 2-3 years in about 1905.--W.A.Seed
1374
To 1371 "trivia guy" Since you're into trivia, here's a question- What is one of Powell Crosleys Jr's claims to fame? -W.A.Seed
1375---- I'm about to loose my sanity trying to figure which of the big two canals here in Ohio was chosen as the Great lakes connection with the Ohio River. So far all I have read is friendly rhetoric and I'm not convince if any dialog is factual between Canalwayman and W.A.Seed. How about some non speculatory information and how about a news clipping or an actual reports claiming which canal was picked to handle the job!!
1376 to 1374
Powel Crosley, Jr. (September 18, 1886 – March 28, 1961) was an American inventor, industrialist, and entrepreneur. He and his brother Lewis were responsible for many "firsts" in consumer products and broadcasting. He was the builder of the Crosley automobiles. He was the owner of the Cincinnati Reds major league baseball team for many years. Crosley Field, a stadium in Cincinnati, Ohio, was named for him. The street-level main entrance to Great American Ballpark in Cincinnati is named Crosley Terrace in his honor.
1377
There was no secret that the M & E was in its final days approaching 1900. Many boats were left with the looming thought of an eminent closing... The western side of Ohio never achieved stardom level as an industrial giant, which includes Cincinnati and Toledo. The eastern part yet reflects the living proof without debate of its achievements by its larger and more productive towns alive today by an unbiased comparison to the M&E.
Tim. S
1378
Tim- believe it or not, boats were left rotting on both canals. This hypothetical discussion doesn't include unsubstantiated opinions on the current condition of the the canal towns on either side of the state. You should probably be glad that it doesn't.--W.A.Seed
1378- Shipping goods via Lake Erie weren’t at all cost effective for obvious reasons. Bear in mind this, when the Ohio and Erie Canal became functional, it cost to offload onto lake ships moving freight across Lake Erie. Going to the Atlantic entailed a passage through the Welland Locks paying tolls called Canadian duty. Furthermore, passage through another lock system and again paying the toll within the St.Lawrence Seaway heading towards open water was costly. Freight had to make many transitions from boat to ship. Labor hours stacked up. The most practical method was to get the freight onto the Ohio River via New Orleans, then to open water. That’s the reasoning behind the Muskingum Improvement and Ohio and Erie Canal connection. The idea to connect these two waterways was anticipated for better than 75 years. It was the Muskingum River project which held up the Miami and Erie Canal from a timely completion. With all of the effort and funds pouring into the Muskingum for quality navigation, the state was definitely going to give it a try with a Dresden connection with the Ohio and Erie Canal sooner or later.
ACS member
1379- Was Cleveland heavily involved in the Civil War effort, if so how much? What role did the Ohio and Erie Canal play during the war? What was the name of the textile manufacturer who played their role making the Union Army uniforms?
Christen
1380
1379--Since the tobacco trade with the South had ceased, the first tobacco factory in Cleveland, T. Maxfield & Co., opened in 1862. The GARMENT INDUSTRY also prospered. Wool had for years been sent to the East for manufacture and then reshipped to Cleveland for sale. In 1862 the German Woolen Factory became the first company to manufacture wool cloth in Cleveland. The firm of Davis, Peixotto & Co. filled at least 1 order for 2,000 uniforms for recruits and 500 officers' uniforms by September 1861. The number of leather dealers increased from 9 to 16 by 1865, possibly due to government orders for military items. A number of local merchants bought military equipment for sale to soldiers. Newspapers advertised military headgear, tailored uniforms, army manuals, rubber blankets, tent blankets, drums, flags, fifes, bugles, swords, sashes, belts, and shoulder straps for sale. H. Hattersly sold revolvers and cavalry carbines. War claims agents offered a variety of services. Drugstores offered bottles of Porter's Cure of Pain to rid soldiers of stomach ailments. The Cleveland Worsted Mill Co. advertised for 1,000 women to knit soldiers' socks and paid $.75 for each pound. The construction and establishment of Camp Cleveland CIVIL WAR CAMPS IN CLEVELAND and the U.S. GENERAL HOSPITAL AT CLEVELAND, both in what was called Univ. Hts. (now TREMONT), employed carpenters, washerwomen, cooks, and several physicians. Bids for cavalry horses and commissary supplies also stimulated the economy.
Because certain ironworks had been manufacturing rifle barrels for the Springfield (MA) Armory, local leaders felt that the central location of steel, lumber, and coal would make Cleveland an ideal location for a national armory. Although a citizens' committee included CLEVELAND CITY COUNCIL representatives, the council quashed the plan in February 1862. Ordnance design remained in the hands of several inventors whose patents apparently never reached production. A Mr. Dickerson claimed to have designed a "centrifugal gun," which, similar to a Gatling gun, could fire 100-500 rounds per minute. Dickerson, finding no interested manufacturers in Cleveland, reportedly tried to sell the gun to enemy authorities in Richmond, VA. A Mr. Hugunin claimed to have developed an artillery projectile that could be fired up to a range of over 4 miles in 25 seconds. W. H. Fargo experimented with a "faciliate" rifled cannon designed to fire all types of shot with greater ease than conventional cannon.
City leaders tried to establish a national military installation as a result of the threatened invasion from Canada by Confederate agents during the 1864 Johnson's Island Lake Erie Conspiracy. City council felt that Pres. Lincoln should forgo the Rush-Bagot Agreement of 1817 with Great Britain, which limited the number and armament of naval ships on the Great Lakes. GEORGE B. SENTER† and RICHARD C. PARSONS† presented the case to the president and to the Congressional Committee on Naval Affairs, requesting that U.S. Navy ships be put on the Great Lakes to protect American shores and American commerce from foreign enemies. Furthermore, they wanted to establish a U.S. Navy yard at Cleveland to build, equip, and repair naval ships. State legislator RUFUS SPALDING†'s resolution to establish the yard received no further consideration outside of the Committee on Naval Affairs.
1381---My family came from Pennsylvania in the 1840s and nestled in a area near Malvern, Ohio named Wirtenburg. I can't seem to locate its whereabouts. Does anyone know of such a place?
1382
to 1378. I did some more research on thecanal improvemen subject & discovered that the federal government did comission surveys & reports from 1880 through about 1894 in regard to improving a Ohio canal for naval purposes. The Miami & Erie was the first surveyed & had a cost estimate of about $28M to be incresed in size to a minimum 70'wide & 7' in depth. Both terminuses would have been relocated. The number of locks would have been reduced from 105 to 77. Seven other routes were later considered including a cross cut from the O&E to the M&E with the increase of width to 85' as well as depth. All plans required building new reservoirs & enlargement of the existing ones. This plan also would have ended hydraulic useage of canal water (to conserve water). It was ultimately decided that not enough water would be available,cost, & the dimenisions were not adequate for naval vessels.
The primary reason for these plans: The ability to rush navy ships to the great lakes in case of war with Great Britain !!-W.A.Seed
1383 to 1382
I would definitely go along with the idea that the M&E would be better suited for the purpose of national defense. Lately, I have been going over and making comparisons between both canal systems and my conclusion stands as this. If the M&E would have been the first of the two canals built, it would probably be in service today. After a good week’s worth of comparison of both canals, it's clear that the M&E is watered by a better and more consistent flow of water and has bigger channels in its adjacent rivers. If Alfred Kelley wouldn't have had his office in Cleveland, the Miami and Erie Canal would have been the preferred route to the Ohio River, no doubt. In case of an attack by the British, Cincinnati was positioned closer to St Louis and New Orleans and naval vessels could easily obtain access to the Great Lakes, saving valuable time and hundreds of un-necessary miles rather than sailing the Ohio River to enter at Marietta.
Canalwayman
1384
To 1383- Glad that you'd made the effort to visit the western canal. Wish you had given me a heads-up, would have enjoyed giving you a time-efficient tour of the highlights & more obscure sites on the M&E. The water supply of its adjacent rivers are a lot more abundant in the fall than in the heat of the summer. I do think it had a better designed reservoir system than the O & E. Which areas did you see? I agree with you that the timeline of canal construction was dictated more by politics than engineering data.---W.A.Seed
1385 to 1381-The Stark County Historical Society has in there possession a map which outlines the canal placement of both sides of the Big Sandy Creek from Minerva to Malvern. This 1840 draft interesting enough has the long lost village of Lodi and with it an area spelled similar to your request naming it Wirtemburg.
Most of the agitation on the Sandy & Beaver was centered on New Lisbon, now Lisbon. The finances came from Philadelphia, the backbone of the project. It’s not too surprising that the bulk of the construction prior to 1837 shut down. The navigational company then devoted its full concentration to the canal’s eastern division.
1386- Politics dictated the course of Ohio's first canal system. Toledo, as always, was well- situated as a more suitable connection to the Ohio River by using the proposed Miami & Erie Canal in the indecisive days before the final decision was made.
1387
I think the state needed both of the two mainline canals when both were started in 1825. I do have the strong opinion that the Miami & Erie should have been completed in its entirety,quickly,like the Ohio & Erie had been. If it had, the state would have reaped the tremendous revenue on the western side like it did on the eastern side thru the mid 1850s. Its peicemeal construction funding of the M&E through 1845 only drove up its cost but also delayed its benefits.--W.A.Seed
1388--------Lock 44 is an original Miami and Erie Canal lock and Providence Metropark is the only place in Ohio in which visitors are able to travel completely through a functioning canal lock.
Toby
1389 / 1388 -Big deal!so you have a working lock. We have miles and miles of watered canal and 100 miles of prime towpath and hiking trails and continuing an expansion project with an objective to re-towpath the Ohio and Erie Canal onto Portsmouth!!
Troy
1390
Canalwayman and W.A.Seed both have things wrong pertaining the latest proposal as of April 16, 1907 when a more sensible route was being explored to connect Lake Erie to the Ohio River.
Barberton Herald:
It is announced that the surveys for the proposed canal from Lake Erie to the Ohio River have been completed. Lands for the right of way is now being rapidly acquired and active digging on the waterway will as it’s said begin early next spring.
When the big undertaking is completed it will be possible for lake vessels to carry iron ore direct from Lake Superior to Pittsburgh district and send coal from western Pennsylvania mines to upper lake ports.
It will require about six years to complete the task and an expenditure of no less than$75.000.000. The proposed canal will be 183 miles in length, and 177 feet in width and 13 feet deep. A special line of boats will be constructed for this traffic. The canal will follow a natural waterway when possible.
It will connect with lake Erie at a point a few miles west of Ashtabula, run southward through creek, valleys and the Mahoning River and Beaver creek and join the Ohio River at Beaver Pennsylvania about thirty miles northwest of Pittsburgh, The canal will pass through Youngstown Ohio, Newcastle and Beaver PA and by means of the Ohio and the Monongahela Rivers will touch scores of furnaces and other industrial plants and coal fields along the route.
You two are so consumed with being right all the time, you to ignorant to look in other directions.
Henslowe
1391- A Lake Erie - Ohio River Canal from the mouth of the Beaver River at Rochester, Pa. to a point near Ashtabula, Ohio on Lake Erie has been under consideration for a number of years.
The canalization of a part of this route from Rochester, Pa. via the Beaver and Mahoning Rivers to Struthers, Ohio, six miles south of the center of Youngstown, Ohio, has also been considered and vigorously supported by Youngstown interests. This is known as the stub or dead end canal, and efforts to have its construction approved by the U. S. Senate failed in December 1944.
The through canal from Rochester to Ashtabula would be up approximately 105 miles long and in the 1939 report of the U. S. Army Engineers was estimated to cost $240,000,000, although railroad Engineers estimated the cost considerably above that amount.
As result of a resolution adopted in July 1946 by the Committee on Rivers and Harbors of U. S. House of Representatives, the Board of Engineers was requested to review the 1939 report to determine current est mate of costs and benefits of a through canal and the advisability of providing a project depth suitable for both lake and river traffic.
The District Engineer at Pittsburgh has now completed his study of this proposed waterway and the subject will soon be set for hearing before the Army Engineers Board for Rivers and Harbors.
According to the report prepared by the District Engineer the cost of the canal is now estimated at more than $439,000,000, or almost twice the amount shown in the 1939 report. Annual maintenance is estimated at more than $20,000,000. Railroad Engineers are now engaged on a study of this project, and it is anticipated they will develop even greater costs than shown by the Army Engineers. The annual prospective tonnage for the canal is estimated at 36,714,000 tons, consisting chiefly of coal, coke, iron ore and stone, with average annual savings to shippers of $24,455,000. The effect on rail carriers revenues of such a loss of tonnage would possibly exceed $70,000,000.
1392--Construction on the Miami and Erie Canal began in 1825 and continued until 1845. Workers were paid thirty cents a day to dig the canal and many suffered from disease. When finished, the canal extended from Toledo to Cincinnati, Ohio. The entire canal system was 301.49 miles long and played a major role in the development of cities along the canal. By the time the canal was completed in 1845, however, railroads began to replace the four- to five-mile-an-hour canal boats and by 1905 the canal was only used sporadically.
1393--The canal carried freight traffic from 1827 to 1861, and then freight traffic rapidly diminished due to the construction of railroads. From 1862 to 1913, the canal served as a water source to industries and towns. In 1913, much of the canal system was abandoned after critical sections were destroyed by severe flooding.
1394
The Beaver and Erie Canal, also known as the Erie Extension Canal, was part of the Pennsylvania Canal system and consisted of three sections: the Beaver Division, the Shenango Division, and the Conneaut Division. The canal ran 136 miles (219 km) north–south near the western edge of the state from the Ohio River to Lake Erie through Beaver County, Lawrence County, Mercer County, Crawford County, and Erie County, Pennsylvania.
There was already a connection from Lake Erie with the Ohio River. Although it had its limitations and restrictions held by canal standards of capacity by the length and width of the standard canal boat.
The construction of an intercoastal waterway along the Ohio and Pennsylvania border was in its final stages at the state house level in the 1940s. Who was surprised when shot down by increased opposition by the railways heavily established throughout both states.
A close examination of the Pennsylvanian water shed that crosses into Ohio and the capacity in which the Ohio and Mahoning Rivers could give to this proposed water way clearly makes a good argument for its potential as a successful working waterway.
Building such a connector would have devastating affects on our railways coasting those millions in lost revenues.
The Mahoning River was already set in motion to adequately supply the needs in which this proposed system could operate with a series of reservoirs and dams making the water supply of the Ohio and Erie Canal at the Portage lakes look miniscule by comparison.
1395-In response to entry 1390, being called ignorant may be strong words coming from you. Before you make a claim like that, check your grammar, your closing sentence was improper grammar to say the least. I’d be certain that my grammar could use some work too. I’m ignorant to brain surgery - not the canal systems.
Bear this in mind, the Ashtabula Canal proposal never made it past the drawing board. The Miami and Erie Canal along with the Ohio and Erie Canal were tangible, unlike the proposal you’re all excited about.
I totally disagree with the closing paragraph in listing 1394. Listing 1394 makes comparison of the Portage Lakes to the series of dams and reservoirs on the Mahoning River. The comparison said the Portage Lakes are miniscule by comparison; I have a hard time believing that to be fact. The Ohio and Erie Canal was gearing up to make the connection link between Lake Erie and the Ohio River bigger and better than its original design.
Without being ignorant as to what other options were available just after going into the twentieth century, I still feel as if the Ohio and Erie Canal was the best bet as the new state barge canal. My friend W.A.Seed will disagree with that. He has outlined a good scenario as to why the Miami and Erie Canal should have been the chosen route. I can almost agree with him, although there is just too much compelling information which leads towards the Ohio and Erie Canal as the chosen route.
Here’s an article: Improving Ohio and Erie Canal.
The Ohio & Erie Canal is being improved from Cleveland to Dresden. The United States Government is completing a lock at Dresden by which the old canal bed will be connected with the Muskingum River which will be used to Marietta. The State of Ohio is spending $800.000 to improve the canal principally between Akron and Cleveland. Forty two new concrete locks have been built. The waterway is to be over six feet deep from the Summit level at Barberton northward to Cleveland and southward to Dresden. A fleet of twenty five new boats will be built by the Ohio Canal & Transportation Co. of Cleveland. The will more than double the capacity of the old boats, be built of steel and propelled by gasoline engines or steam. The new Reservoir of 800 acres at the State mill is for additional water supply for the nine mile summit level from Akron to Barberton. With the new reservoir and chain of lakes a few miles east of the Magic City, the state will have 1800 acres of water storage at the summit level to feed the canal. The summit level from Barberton to Akron, Nesmith Lake, Summit Lake, Long Lake,Turkeyfoot Lake, east, west and north Tuscarawas Reservoirs have been formed to join the Portage Lakes as a park for the State of Ohio. The Magic City has a part of this park within its municipal boundaries, and this entire grandest park in the state is within easy reach by boat or launch. The park is under state police patrol and the game plant and wildlife and therefore protected under the law. The distance from Cleveland to Dresden is 150 miles, from Dresden to Marietta is 92 making the new waterway 242 miles of proposed Ohio Canal expansion.
1396
To posting 58. I live in Bolivar and haven't as of yet stumbled across this mythical canal and marker on the Zoarolites side of the Muskingum River, are you for certain we're are at the place near lock 10 and the Zoar Inn?
1397 Responding to 1396. You're at the wrong place. Cross the old 82 bridge and head back towards the arboretum, and after 50 or so yards cut into the right and to your surprise, you'll eventually end up at another canal and just follow it, then let me know what you find. You need to go to other side.
1398
On the approach to Three Locks Road after leaving Chillicothe, which side of the freeway did the canal sit on?
1399- I wonder why Dry Run Culvert, Pond Creek Culvert weren't renamed aqueducts as Camp Creek, Scioto Brush Creek and Bear Creek were?
1400-
Dry run and Pond creek remained stone arch culverts until the end of the canal era. The others you referenced were converted into wooden flumed aqueducts. A portion of Pond creeks arch can still be seen.
1401
To 1395- I guess we'll have to agree to disagree on which of the two mainline canals would have been more suitable to be upgraded to a full fledged barge canal.
All arguments are hypothetical, I still think the western canal potentially would have provided the necessary water to bring the plan to fruition. The O & E potentially would have been the lower cost plan, but with a iffy supply of water.
Since neither plan was implemented,we're at least left with many extant remnants & towpath trails that can still be explored & discussed.-- W.A.Seed
1402
T0 1389 (Troy) Actually getting the opportunity to lock through via mule power is a kind of a big deal to a dedicated canawler. Take the the time,leave your parents basement & check out whats out there. It's more gratifying than doing your research via Wikipedia.-- W.A.Seed
1403-To 1398 & 1399. Looking for the canal bed to the south of Chillicothe can be difficult for someone lacking the knowledge for the actual former towpath. It is sort of a zigzag course, so bear with me. While in Chillicothe, to get on track, get on W. Water St., then proceed east turning right on Mulberry St and then traveling south until you reach E. 5th Street, turn right onto it. Again heading east, you’ll be coming up on S. Hickory St. A very interesting sight is about 100 feet before reaching Hickory. Look to your left and you’ll see the canal bed form, it sits next to a tan-colored corner house. The 5th street lock was at that point. A rather large basin was just across 5th St. and from that point, a hydraulic canal spilled into Paint Creek to the south. From here, I’m going to put you partially on the former path of the canal as we head south. Turn right on Hickory and veer to the left on Old Eastern Ave, then left on 7th to Bridge St where you’ll be turning right or south. The former canal crossed over the highway, Rt. 23, and swung around to the south and ran left of Bridge St. for several miles, passing by Paint Creek and heading down Three Locks Rd. parallel to the railroad which ran east of the canal bed. At Paint Creek, bear in mind that one of the state’s longest aqueducts spanned there during the canal era, directly west of the massive railroad bridge there now. I wish that I knew its exact length while in service.
Dry Creek Culvert and Pond Creek Culverts were stone arch designs. They were much shorter than Bear Creek, Scioto Brush Creek and Camp Creek Aqueducts that were formerly named culverts until the stone water conduit was replaced with wooden flumes. The canal commission felt that it would be appropriate to call them aqueducts, as they were slightly longer and a different type of structure than the culverts. The three aqueducts just mentioned, generally had water passing below them throughout all the seasons. The two culverts mentioned, were usually dry. Dry Run Culvert was removed in 2005, as posting 1400 mentions that part of Pond Creek Culvert can be found.
1404 Dry Run Culvert in Scioto County was destroyed for no good cause in 2004 and set stacked for several years, what a waste! Paint Creek aqueduct was the longest of all spans within the confines of the O&E Canal over 500 ft.
Canawler
1405-How long?
1406
to 1404- Everything I've read on the Ohio & Erie has the Circleville aqueducts length listed at 450', the Painter Creek structure at roughly 270'-290'. The site at Painters presently appears wider but that could be the result of flooding & dredging over the past 90+ years.-- W.A.Seed
1407 to 1406. Which of all the aqueducts on the O&E were the longest?
1408-
To 1407- The aqueduct at Circleville was the longest on the Ohio & Erie. In fact it was the longest span on the entire Ohio canal system. The 300' great Miami aqueduct 9 miles north of Dayton was the longest one on the Miami & Erie.-- W.A.seed
1409 On the Ohio and Erie Canal the Paint Creek Aqueduct was slightly longer than it neighboring aqueduct up at Circleville by a mere 25 feet.
1410- I had the experience of extensively investigating the area around the Paint Creek Aqueduct on several occasions. It’s hard to say whether the land abutments for the steel bridge on either end are original in length to the aqueduct. If they are, they span nearly six hundred feet apart, the length of the steel railroad bridge there today. That measurement was done toe-to-heel and probably isn’t too far off from an accurate measurement. I tend to go along with W.A.Seed and allow for expansion by erosion from its original width within the confines of Paint Creek. What I’ve pondered was whether or not the support blocks used to hold the railroad bridge up, were once from the aqueduct. It’s clear to see that the railroad bridge there today sits just east of the former canal bed and the supports were not used in their formal life as aqueduct supports, unless moved slightly to the east, fully assembled. Anyone who has studied these supports has surely noticed that it certainly looks as if the upper courses were altered to obtain more height. Who knows?
1411-The railroad trestle at Paint Creek is rather lengthy but, there is a longer one spanning the Ohio canal, where is it?
1412
1411 A trestle of great length sits down from Akron's lock 1 near and overtop of Munsun Rubber Company at lock 11. There are no others of any considerable length.
1413 to 1412-You are wrong about that. That particular railroad trestle is long by all means. For those who haven't a clue where this great trestle is located, it can be found in Akron and it stretches quite a distance over the Cascade Locks on the northern end of the Portage Summit. This can be seen by looking to the south from North St or the Mustill Store.. I don't believe that it's as long as the Paint Creek trestle. The longest of all trestles can be located further north and crosses the canal and towpath at the 49th St. Canalway Reservation Museum.
1414- The Reservation Museum has on display a rather well made map featuring the towns along the Ohio canal. On it, it has Kendall as a stopping point. Was Kendal a waterfront town?
1415
to 1414-
Kendal, Ohio geographically sits a good mile east of the Ohio and Erie Canal. It never connected directly with the towpath but in a round-about-way did. In the year 1812, Thomas Rotch records the village of Kendal. 20 years later, the entire length of the Ohio and Erie Canal was open. In 1827, James Duncan organizes Massillon's first school. It was 1828 when the first canal boats arrive in the port of Massillon. A couple of years later, Kendal began phasing out or fading away. By the year of 1832, Duncan, Wales, and Skinner bought land to join Massillon with Kendal and that’s the round-about-way Kendal bordered up with the towpath.
During its early days, Kendal was a small community of less than a hundred homes. Kendal was named after a town in England. Kendal was set up on Sippo Creek, a place where Thomas Rotch set up a carding mill and James Duncan set up a grist mill near Fremont St. at the Ohio and Erie Canal later on. Massillon became the dominant port of Stark County and Kendal lived in its shadows. Today, Kendal is about a whole city block long. There are a few buildings reflecting the Kendal name.
The new town, which was laid out in the winter of 1825-26, was called Massillon, upon the suggestion of Mrs. Duncan, who was a lady of culture, an especially fine French scholar and a great admirer of Jean Baptiste Massillon, the celebrated Roman Catholic bishop in the days of Louis XIV. On the 18th day of January, 1826, forty-four sections of the canal were let at Mr. Duncan's residence in Kendal, which was the only brick house in the village.
1415- Responding to 1300,1301 and 1302. That's very interesting about Canton's try at entering the canal era. I would like to hear more on it.
Rodney
1415
1414-Canton was quite overshadowed, the position of the latter as the county seat being even threatened.
During the period of Massillon's supremacy, Canton had made several attempts to get into water communication with the Ohio system which had so neglected her. A few years after the opening of the Lake Erie & Ohio Canal the Sandy & Beaver Canal was constructed from Glasgow, on the Ohio River, westward to Bolivar in Tuscarawas County, on the Ohio Canal, cutting, on its route thither, through the southeast corner of Stark County, and including Waynesburg and Magnolia.
The citizens of Canton thought they saw their chance to get into the Ohio Canal system through the Sandy & Beaver enterprise, and therefore organized the Nimishillen & Sandy Slackwater Navigation Company. The design of that corporation was to build a canal by way of the Nimishillen and Sandy creeks to the Sandy & Beaver Canal some miles north of its junction with the Ohio Canal. It was to pass through Canton, thus giving the city water communication with the world. The business men at the county seat naturally took a deep interest in the combined enterprise, and ground was broken on Walnut Street with the most imposing ceremonies. A plow drawn by ten yoke of oxen and large enough almost to include a canal in one furrow, was used to inaugurate this new internal improvement. Part 1
Part 2.John Danner, in one of his interesting pioneer papers, has this to say of the outcome of these twin enterprises, and the obliteration of the old-time rivalry between Massillon and Canton : "The contractor for building the canal in Canton was the late Rodman Lovett, father of Mesdames John H. Smith and John A. Hay, who still reside in Canton. Mr. Lovett performed his work well, so that the canal running from North street south on Walnut to the present Pennsylvania Railroad, and thence directly westward across the property occupied by the present works of the Aultman Company, crossing Market street at Navarre, and thence running south on the west side of Market street to the south creek, was all finished ready for the water. After all this work was done, it was found that the Sandy & Beaver Canal was not a success, and that for the want of funds the project was likely to prove a failure. It was also discovered that Shriver's run, from which it was expected to supply the canal with water down as far as the south creek, was not sufficient, and this, with other difficulties and complications, caused the work to cease right there. Many thousands of dollars were lost in this operation and Walnut street stood for years as a witness of the folly of those early days. It was more frequently called Canal street than Walnut. Finally the old ditch was graded to the ground level, but not until much murmuring and complaint on the part of the citizens who lived on Walnut street. The canal was never filled with water, and much less was it ever used for floating wheat and other products to market.
"For many years after the above failure to secure for Canton canal facilities, Massillon controlled the heavy produce not only of Stark county, but of quite a number of other counties, including Wayne and Holmes, and even Carroll, Columbiana and Jefferson counties sent much of their produce to the Massillon market. From 1840 to 1850 the great tide of trade that went through Canton to Massillon was such that three or four country taverns between these two places did quite a profitable business in entertaining the farmers and providing accommodations for their teams, when they were thus en route to and from the great wheat market which had been created at Massillon. The tide was so largely in favor of Massillon and against Canton during that decade that an effort was made to secure the removal of the county seat to Massillon, and at one time it seemed very probable that this further obscuring of Canton would be accomplished. The writer was at the time a resident of Massillon, and often heard it said 'Canton is about finished and ready to be fenced in, so that the grass may grow in its streets ; ' and so it almost appeared for awhile. But in 1851, when the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne & Chicago Railroad became an assured fact, Canton was put on a level with other towns, and Ball, Aultman & Company located their manufacturing establishment here (Canton). Conditions began rapidly to change in our favor, and from that day to this Canton has had wonderful prosperity and growth, while Massillon also has grown to be a city of great wealth and influence."
The disadvantages under which Canton labored, as long as it was denied either waterways or railways, may be realized when it is known that its merchants in getting their supplies, from the East had to transport them by way of the canal to Massillon, or have them hauled from Pittsburgh. The latter method involved heavy freight charges and a time expenditure of from six to seven days.
1416-Somewhere along the Ohio and Erie Canal is the oldest known park in Ohio. Once a major river, later on known as the "Old Bed". Where is this place?
1417 to 1416- The oldest park here in Ohio is along the former Ohio and Erie Canal. Buckeye Lake, constructed as a canal feeder lake in 1826, is Ohio's oldest state park. The Old River bed is now Yoctangee Park which bordered the canal as well. It was established in 1875 when the course of the Scioto River was changed in Chillicothe to prevent flooding. The result was a stagnant swamp that had growing health concerns. To remedy that situation, the city devised a tax which cleaned up the "Old River Bed" and made a park that everyone could enjoy.
Canalwayman
1419 in response to 1413. That high trestle was part of the Northern Ohio Traction and street-car rail company.
Cascade Locks
1421 to 1420
The taller of the trestles, at lock 11, was built in 1891 by the Pittsburgh, Akron and Western railroad. It was made of steel and was replaced in 1926. The stone piers form the original bridge are still there. The shorter trestle at lock 13 was built in 1880 by the Valley LIne Railroad. It was made of wood and was replaced between 1910 and 1916.
The NOTL ran down the center of Market Street, which crossed the canal over a stone arch bridge.
1422-Generally, the knowledge of a frequent reader to this site who goes by the name of Canal Dog, has any information about Akron and its canals nailed down tight. In the case of the bridge constructed by the Northern Ohio Traction & Light Co., he probably should re-evaluate his findings. The stone supports which are still visible near the Ohio & Erie Canal Lock 10 north of Akron, lead off in a northwestern direction. The current bridge that stands today, spans east to west only. The tracks are now gone, laid by the Traction Co. These tracks connected Akron with Cleveland and all of our neighboring cities. Although after a thorough investigation and outline, Akron had 80 miles of tracks within Summit County.
Akron Beacon Journal, Friday, July 8, 1977, has an article which highlights the bridge in question, complete with a photograph. Its contents are as follows: BRIDGING THE CANAL IN 1882…Construction of the northern Ohio Traction & Light Co.’s bridge over the Ohio Canal north of Market St. This bridge is gone now but its stone piers can still be seen.
Is the article and picture incorrect?
1423 IN RESPECT TO 1421... In the year of 1880, Akron a city and the county-seat of Summit County, Ohio, on the Little Cuyahoga river was connected by means of the following. It is served by the Baltimore & Ohio, the Erie, the Northern Ohio, and the Cleveland, Akron & Columbus railways, and by inter-urban electric lines and by the Ohio Canal. The Inter Urban line connected at the power station near the canal lock 10. Its tracks were electrically energized on the Northern Ohio Traction Bridge, other than the bridge by overhead lines in places. The bridge is not one in the same as the railroad bridge spanning the canal as present. The only similarities between the two are only this, they were close in locale…
1423 to 1422
I got my information form Craig Sanders "Akron Railroads", which also has a photo of the bridge in question. You are right about the stone piers being oriented slightly different. It was common for railroads to build a replacement brige while the orignal was still being used, which would account for the realignment.
Herbert Harwood wrote a beautifully detailed history of the NOTL, which contains many photos and maps. He has a 1920 map of the system in Akron which shows the bridge in question. It is labled as being owned by the AC&Y Railroad and shows the NOTL crossing the canal at Market Street.
THe NOTL connected to Cleveland via Cuyahoga Falls. The tracks went up Howard Street Hill and then down Cuyahoga Falls Ave. Another route, called the mountain line, crossed the LIttle Cuyahoga Valley on a long wooden trestle, just to the west of the Rte 8 bridge. It crossed the gorge on the east side of Front St, where the piers can still be seen in the river.
1424
I'd like to wish 1423 & everyone else whose written in a Safe & merry Christmas.-- W.A.Seed
1425- What were the name of the first productive coal mines in and along the towpath?
Tom Canal Fulton
1426- While enjoying the towpath above Massillon heading due north into Canal Fulton, don't be mislead, the towpath was on the opposite side now known as Erie Street.
1427 to 1426. I don’t believe that you’re entirely correct when claiming the location of the stretch of towpath between Massillon and Canal Fulton was along the Erie Street side of the canal. Businesses generally set up on the towpath side. In various places, the towpath was on both sides throughout the canal system and if the need to change over to the other side became necessary, it was done by use of a change bridge. By using the towpath section going into Canal Fulton coming from the south as an example, I would believe the towpath was basically where it’s at today. Just off the top of my head, if I had to say where the towpath was located in the area of the McLaughlin Dry dock at Canal Fulton, I would be almost sure that terrain difficulties directly across from it puts the towpath where it’s at now. Old maps and land plats for instance, using Lock 4 and its former milling operation as an example, provide evidence that the towpath still remains where it’s at now.
1428
to 1425- The first and most foremost coal mining operations set up in northern Ohio at Massillon, by name were the Willow Bank & Bridgeport Mines. Willow bank received its name from a mine in South Wales by the same name.
1429- In what time frame did Navarre Ohio see a noticeable decline in commerce generated on the Ohio Canal?
1430 to 1429-Massillon, Canton and Navarre are only three of the countless towns who felt the blow dealt when the railways arrived. Navarre was a town locked in bitter conflict with its immediate neighbors of Rochester and Bethlehem over which could outbid the other for granary storage. To end this dispute, Navarre won the vote by the officials from all the villages after the onslaught of the bidding wars caused a financial depression set in motion by Massillon’s James Duncan to gain control. The Farmers Merchant Association was established, stripping James Duncan of his power. 1852 marked the year when the first heart-felt blow hit canal transportation when the tracks were being laid less than a stone’s throw from the towpath. The Farmers Association was short-lived and failed in 1856 when more tracks from the Cleveland & Tuscarawas Valley ran close to Navarre and a train station was soon established along with loading docks within a mile of town. A station was finally put in the village in 1876 with a huge decline in the canal trade. It was evident that it wasn’t going to get any better. A huge change came upon the faces of those who worked so diligently to keep the train station at a distance and who had canal interest. They realized that if they were to survive, they had no choice but to welcome the trains and turn their backs on the dying canal. It was 1873 when the three villages united, having only one post office – naming it Navarre.
1431-Was Crichton's Inn located at Rush town lock 49?
Bill Enthusiast
1432 to 1431. Crichton’s Inn was not at lock 49, but sat just a bit north near McDermott Pond Rd. The inn was situated on the western side of the towpath. Between the lock and the inn was a huge train trestle crossing over the canal of the N&W R.R. The exact position of the former trestle can be identified today where the road barely north of the lock slightly jogs and a railway is still there. The inn was built on a well-known stage coach line and later was enhanced by the coming of the Ohio & Erie Canal which made it a regular stop for the packet boats. The train station was stationed at the center of Rushtown closer to the lock than the inn itself. The inn boasted having 30 guest rooms and could seat 100 for dinner. The main attraction at the inn was its rather enormous hammock of a whopping 40 feet tied between two huge oaks. Many lounged out under the sky enjoying this busy area of the canal and the activity the trains brought daily. It was an ideal place for weary travelers to mingle. Crichton’s Inn did not house a tavern, keeping the rowdy canawlers away. The inn finally closed its doors in 1919 when the canal was officially closed and the railroad station was removed.
1433---Scenic Scioto Heritage Trail Ohio Byway sign at lock 48 has misleading information.
Lock 48 is part of the extensive Ohio & Erie Canal that was constructed between 1825 and 1847. The canal provided a water route between the East Coast and the Gulf of Mexico and gave a reliable form of transportation for Ohio’s agricultural product’s and natural resources. After 1855 the railroads began to impact the canal and in 1913 the canal system came to an abrupt end. However, the Ohio & Erie Canal played an important role in the United States economy at a time when our country was establishing itself as a new nation.
1434---The historical Society from Scioto County and its out-spoken Judith Ross of the Canal Society march to the beat of their own drum. It's good to see advancements are underway to highlight the Ohio & Erie Canal into their county. Their information is contradictory from paragraph to paragraph. Some of their work is good, but they fill in the blanks with what ever sounds good. I would recommend to check with the CSO to gain any questionable information given by the (History Machine from Scioto County).....October 20, 1832, owing to the prevalence of cholera, the celebration was deferred. December 1, 1832, the canal was completed. April 1, 1837, G. J. Leet had a line of packets to Columbus which went through in twenty-four hours. June 3, 1837. there was a line of boats running through to Cleveland. September 23, 1837, the flood destroyed the culvert at Camp Creek and the canal was broken. Extra stages were put on and teams employed to handle passengers and goods. January 2, 1838, navigation was closed, and the new aqueduct at Camp Creek was not finished. January 23, 1838, navigation was resumed. Between January 6th and 21st there arrived at Portsmouth 8,031 barrels of pork, 5,571 barrels of flour, 561 barrels of whiskey, 176 barrels of lard, butter 108 kegs, cheese 141 casks. Two or three large steamboats were freighted for New Orleans. July 10, 1838. the project of the lateral canal was discussed in the Scioto Tribune.
The Ohio Canal from Cleveland to Portsmouth is 306 miles long, with feeder 11 miles, total length 317 miles. It cost $4,695,203. Licking County reservoir covers 3,600 acres. November 13, 1887, the extension of the Ohio canal to the Ohio river was celebrated. It cost $10,000 and only one boat ever went through it.
1435
1434 This paragraph under is a good example of the inaccuracies being published out of Portsmouth…. “”(The corrective questions are in parentheses)”” “Quote phrases are published from Portsmouth” “January 2, 1838, navigation was closed, and the new aqueduct at Camp Creek was not finished”. (Now keep in mind that the camp Creek aqueduct is closed blocking all canal traffic into Portsmouth.) “January 23, 1838, navigation was resumed”. (The canal has been down 21 days). “Between January 6th and 21st there arrived at Portsmouth 8,031 barrels of pork, 5,571 barrels of flour, 561 barrels of whiskey, 176 barrels of lard, butter 108 kegs, cheese 141 casks”. (How can that have taken place with the canal down for 21 days?) “Two or three large steamboats were freighted for New Orleans”. (That does sound like make believe, what’s the name of the boats?) July 10, 1838. The project of the lateral canal was discussed in the Scioto Tribune.
“The Ohio Canal from Cleveland to Portsmouth is 306 miles long, (308) with feeder 11 miles, total length 317 miles.” (The former statement is totally incorrect, the feeders weren’t considered in the mainline mileage but were branch canals of their own length which were not included in the terminus to terminus measurements) It cost $4,695,203. Licking County reservoir covers 3,600 acres. (Where is this information from?) “November 13, 1887, the extension of the Ohio canal to the Ohio river was celebrated. It cost $10,000 and only one boat ever went through it.” (What boat?)
The Portsmouth Historical and Scioto Valley Canal Societies do march to their own beat. Nearly everything they put out there is wrong which causes conflicting information. According to them, it all started right there in Portsmouth? I have taken the time to review all of their scripts; amazingly, they make statements without any backing or proof. Down there, proof falls into the hearsay category. I have scoured their historical archives which took a whole hour, the libraries have nothing. I’m not making light that they have so little to go on, it’s a shame that better records were not kept throughout the ages. I commend their efforts, although they really need to deal in facts. So far, they and demonstrate the un- willingness to work with more knowledgeable sources to check things out before spreading speculation using them as facts. The canal director from Scioto County acts as if she has privy information and insight which no others can obtain. When cornered about areas of concern, she passes the blame to either someone over in Kentucky or members who name cannot be reveled. Be careful readers, and check out anything passed on from the Scioto Valley canal Society for accuracy. Every one of us uses speculation often in our appendages and can raise eyebrows from time to time. Down there, they change history without proof!!
1436--The Ohio Canal passed through several counties one of which was Scioto. The others were Cuyahoga, Summit, Stark, Tuscarawas, Coshocton, Muskingum, Licking, Fairfeild, Franklin, Pickaway, Ross and Pike Counties. Of those listed, Scioto County was the least profitable offering far less in the industrial and agricultural sector. Cleveland of Cuyahoga County was the leader with Akron of Summit County the second in line. Massillon and Navarre of Stark County hold the third spot and as we go south in number form Cleveland, the fourth county down the canal holds the fourth place and that's Tuscarawas County by way of Dover and New Philadelphia and the great coal reserves of the county. Number five, Ross County holds that position as the industrial and agricultural leader on the canals southern end with Circleville of Pickaway County as number six followed by Fairfield County filling spot number seven. Franklin County servicing Columbus was surprisingly at spot number eight. Licking County was the ninth place in the line up with Newark putting it there, spot ten was Coshocton County followed by Muskingum County at eleven who had little industry to boast of by comparison. Pike County was the twelfth spot followed by Scioto the last of them holding position thirteen. I find it disturbing that so much bad information culminates out of Scioto County. I was thrown back with the construction dates on display at Herod’s lock 48, totally incorrect posted by the Scioto Valley Canal Society.
1437-In the decision making process of whether or not a canal would pass over the Scioto River and grace Portsmouth met with stiff opposition from the Canal Commission who stood against the placement of an aqueduct spanning the river at any point. Unlike Cleveland, Portsmouth was nearly blighted, brought on by a yearly onslaught of the Ohio River and its annual flooding, that it inevitably would warrant extensive canal repairs to the canal, dockage and region. An aqueduct if placed would be constantly under construction year to year with a hefty price tag. Lock 54 was indeed the first southern terminus that acquired its name from a link bridge known as The Red Bridge. This bridge was the only way freight entered the city if the rivers were to low to moor. At the terminus lock when river conditions were applicable, river boats could be loaded or unloaded but basically any agitation towards that played out on the river docks uptown. Red Bridge took its name when once it was brightly painted red during a fifty year celebration of the town’s founding father Henry Massie. Portsmouth was first settled on the opposite side of the Scioto River where Alexandria once existed. Heavy flooding forced a change which moved the settlement east of the confluence of the two rivers where Portsmouth sit today.
After closely examining the information placed in motion by the Scioto Valley Canal Society, it’s quite evident they haven’t the resources and knowledge to make an accurate assessment of their times throughout the canal era.
My experience with this subject matter leans towards improper historical input or hearsay that’s spinning out of control. Without a complete review or rebuttal of the contents, they then cast in bronze and make historical markers using false information and the general public believes it as true.
An example which only constitutes simple arithmetic follows; they have placed a marker which states the canal with a feeder added in has changed the total length of 306 miles to 317, inaccuracies on both accounts. I presume they’re making silent mention of the Columbus Feeder, a branch which is just that length at eleven miles ending at Lockbourne descending from downtown Columbus to connect to the Ohio & Erie. If that be the case, then add an additional eleven miles in for the return passage back from the mainline of the Ohio and Erie making the distance now 328 miles. That’s an example of changing history from what we’ve known of the canal. Their scripts are an embarrassment to them. If they would take the time slow down and go over information and calculate times and places and check dates, they would hide away their faces and scrap the whole ordeal.
The Acting President of our southern Ohio Canal Society doesn’t like to have input or listen to reason who smugly thinks the northern historian are self indulgent, arrogant and idiots. She forgets that for decades before she became involved, many that put forth great fortitude and years of research to get to the facts.
Out of determination to get the recognition duly owed to the people of Scioto County for those who strived and sacrificed long ago she lost touch with the true meaning and twist and bends facts and often fills in the blanks. Portsmouth dwindled even with the canal nearby never placed an impact of any great importance mimicking northern canal towns because of its geography with the canal at a distance. The real fact is Portsmouth was never a canal town, a river town, yes. To be recognized as a canal town, a canal had to pass through. Marietta was known always as a river town just up river from Portsmouth. Cincinnati could claim both a river and canal town. Cincinnati is considered to have been the first American boomtown in the heart of the country in the early nineteenth century to rival the larger coastal cities in size and wealth. Portsmouth never rated as much of either.
1438-I had to remove a few postings concerning Judith Ross from Portsmouth for having bad taste. I know this person and what she's doing is simply trying to have Scioto County recognized equally as the canals northern counter parts counties have. Over last couple of years, I put forth some effort by helping her do some work which hopefully will put at least one of the locks in the National Registry. I can't say that I agree with her thinking on certain historic matters and dates. I agree that she should slow down and think before making historic markers. There are plenty who could proof these things and offer help if she would ask. At our last conversation, she was reluctant to get on-board the computer age which she claims to dislike.
1439 in respect to 1436.Scioto County made fair progress up to 1830, that is, her ratio of increase of population and increase of material wealth was equal to the average gain of the State, and therefore there was no cause for complaint. But that which gave the greatest impetus to immigration was the Ohio Canal, which had been commenced at Cleveland in 1825. In 1829 work was commenced at Portsmouth and the city, as well as the county, took new life. Corn up to that time had been purchased at 10 cents a bushel, for there was little demand beyond home consumption. Eggs could be purchased for 4 and 5 cents a dozen, and when they got up to 7 it was thought a high price and it was called famine prices. The writer of this read a communication from an unfortunate person, who claimed, in 1834, after the canal was finished, that living was getting entirely too expensive. This person complained of eggs being 8 to 10 cents a dozen and butter from 12 ½ to 15 cents per pound, and said, in the gold old times eggs were 4 or 5 cents a dozen and never over 6, while butter was from 8 to 10 cents per pound and other articles he claimed in proportion had risen 50 to 100 per cent. Corn had actually got up to 20 cents. Yes, living was costing nearly double. But under the inspiration of a more active demand, and prospects of cheaper and more rapid transportation, Scioto County farmers felt encouraged to enlarge their field of operation and production received a new impulse. The canal was finished in 1832, and at one time Portsmouth was the fourth port on the line of the canal in receipt of toll.
1440.The opening of the canal caused an increase of business, the most important of which was the starting of furnaces and the mining of coal and iron ore, the eastern side of the county being rich in these minerals, if coal can be called a mineral. It took some capital to do this, and while it also cause an increase of population, in the latter case, it was not enough to excite comment. In fact local labor seemed to be abundant enough for the work in hand. The population in 1830 was 8,740, a gain of 3,000, lacking ten, over the population of 1820, while that of 1840 was 11,192, a gain of 2,452 over 1830. In 1836 there were five furnaces in blast in Scioto County: Scioto, Franklin, Junior, Bloom and Clinton.
1441-Red bridge found its name from bizarre events surrounding it. The bridge was completed across the Scioto River at a distance of 666 feet in 1849 to replace its former structure which collapsed killing many. Some associated the 666 numeral with Satan and named it Devils Bridge. Not a single structure lasted there. The bridge mentioned fell after its completion only lasting six years and as the first, many fell into the Scioto who drowned. The next bridge to be built was erected in 1855 and it fell after four years in 1859. A suspension bridge was put up above the old bridge and it fell as well. Another suspension bridge was built which lasted into 1877 and it fell. In 1880 the state built a span lasting 40 years from West Portsmouth into Portsmouth after clearing and filling the isthmus and Rt. 52 was born at the same time Old Rt. 51 was known as River Road was closed.
1442 to 1441-River Road was Township Hi-way 152 which also crossed over the Scioto River connecting it with Front Street in Portsmouth. I have no recollection of an Old Rt.51. Many stories have circulated in reference to Red Bridge. Every bridge at that crossing feel into the Scioto River until better means and knowhow were finally developed. A story did circulate that one of the bridges were 666 feet long and had a demonic eeriness because many jumped off it. Morgan’s Raiders took down one of them by burning it in 1863.
1443- Portsmouth had its own shipping company who made passages into the Muskingum River. Portsmouth aso was a popular French trading post.
Leroy
1444 Stark county had better than thirty coal mines according to the local historians. From that number we have far less in number which were accumulated after a thorough investigation. How can a claim be made without solid evidence? Please add to this list if anyone has other names that can be added on.
Bessimer, Blacktide, Roague's Hollow, Pitts, Lawrence, Tuslaw, Guynivere, Loose Timber, Concord, Banshaw, Bridgeport, Beasly's, Battle Axe, Crow's Nest, Pinchgut, Willow.
1445 responding with 1443:Steamboat navigation of the Scioto River was a pet scheme with steamboat men for many years. The record of early years gives no account of any traffic on the river until the winter of 1847-'48. The steamboats built by Kendall & Head, about 1818, came down the Scioto from about the mouth of Brush Creek, but probably they received their boilers, etc., at Portsmouth. The first steamboat, America, went up the river in the winter above mentioned as far as Waverly. It made a prosperous trip and was in the trade during the high water; some three round trips were made. In December, 1848, a small steamer had been built to run up the Scioto, and the experimental trip was made Dec. 12, 1848. She left her moorings and was watched until she was out of sight, by quite a large number of people. She plowed her way gracefully and successfully against the current, and Piketon gave her an ovation. Her name was The Relief. She went up as far as the Feeder Dam, and Salt Creek, and grounded once, but slightly. Then the handsome little steamboat, the John B. Gordon, became the regular Scioto River packet, made regular trips, commencing Feb. 1, 1849, and continued until June. She was owned by the Scioto Valley Steamboat Co., and cost $3,500. Not much more in the steamboat business can be found of record. Railroads and railroad bridges soon put a stop to much further effort, and, although the Scioto is a free highway, her placid bosom has not of late years been disturbed or her waters used for navigation purposes. The last steamer that attempted to do a paying business on the river was a very pretty little craft called the Piketon Belle. She was launched Oct. 26, 1860, and drew only twenty-two inches; was in the trade in 1861, and was built and owned at Piketon. She continued her trips until May 10, 1861.
1446-Part 1—On the stretch between Canal Fulton to Massillon, who would think that there are so many coal mines and shafts which are dangerously left uncovered today? Last fall, I was taken to many of them by a gentleman who lived his whole life in northwest Massillon and his great-grandfather worked many of the coal mines. To my surprise, there was a shaft just over the bridge leading into West Massillon. The rest of them were overall, fairly easy to locate. Most of the mines weren't known names as Willow, Bridgeport, Everhard and Warthorst. Many smaller mines were dug out of the hillside, using the coal to heat their homes and to sell. Some were just barely a scratch in the earth. A story which was told to me during this outing was the many cases of claim jumping that ended with violence and the disappearance of independent miners and their families who decided to stay put. Eventually, bigger mines ran off the smaller operations and secured the surrounding deposits. The way things were supposed to work, for example in the old western days, when a claim was staked, it was then registered within the county and state or territory. Back then, many worked claims without any intention of letting their whereabouts known for secrecy purposes. These were not coal mines, but gold mines instead, but the same principal applies - they also stood the chance of being jumped upon. Many of the local mines in the hills of Stark and Tuscarawas counties weren't registered. It left many without legal recourse. Stemming from that, if they found a rich deposit, the larger companies jumped through the legal loopholes, stormed in and either leased the land from the state or bought it. The end result was the removal of squatter miners and their shafts were taken over. Usually, the local Sherriff carried out the eviction process, whether it was a legal document coming from the courthouse or by following orders from the front office of the larger mines. During a miners’ strike for a measly 2 cent increase in pay per hour, the bigger operations were closed down at Canal Fulton’s mines and the canal boats sat moored empty and waiting long hours for the conflict to end. A turn of events set the stage for violence coming from west of Clinton around Rouges Hollow. Hundreds of wagons moved eastward toward the canal at Clinton to be loaded for transport to Cleveland. It was said that the Rouges Hollow operation had heaping piles on hand and could load for a solid month. The news spread quickly about the arriving coal caravan and out of its confusion, it caused a total blockade in the canal. Fifty boats converged on lock 4 to change direction at the turnaround area. Violence broke out there at Lock 4 because so many desperate boats were trying to get moving and those facing south had to change direction to head north who met with plenty of opposition. After two days of bitter conflict, the mines had no choice but to meet the demands of the diggers; yet, in these two short days, so much violence erupted when the bigger mines sent their henchmen to attempt to block the caravan of coal wagons into Clinton, that many on both sides were shot or beaten up. The violence escalated even more toward the caravan when the angry strikers attacked the over-land caravan of coal haulers who were stopped in their tracks. The coal haulers reorganized with gunmen in plain sight on each wagon, and this time, successfully made their way into Clinton to load canal boats. Continued on part 2.
Part 2--- Between Clinton’s lock 2 & 3, there were hundreds of wagons and as many men loading the boats with the line reaching as far back as Canal Fulton. After the confusion ended, the big mines along with the local law and at a state level, chose to silence the small war which had just played out to suppress bad publicity for the coal companies. They didn’t want the results to be spread throughout the state and give ideas to other mines having thousands of disgruntled diggers go out on strike.
My experience with canal affairs points at a strike in 1848, but it was the haulers who were on strike. Maybe the two stories tie together, who knows. This wasn’t the only time violence broke out when the company resorted to violence, killing employees within Stark County. The same scenario played out at Republic Steel in Massillon in the 1930s when the company hired henchmen who shot down striking employees.
1447---A Great Wagon Road between the Hudson River and Lake Erie, over the Route now Covered by the Erie Railroad, Suggested more than 100 Years Ago by Gen. James Clinton - Thirty Years later a State Road to Connect the Great Lakes with Tidewater, Through the Same Part of the State, Demanded - First Suggestion for a Railroad Over the Route - The Redfield Pamphlet and its Wonderful Prophecies and Projects - A Government Survey of a Railroad Route that this Pamphlet Outlined in 1829 - How the Project of a Railroad between the Hudson and Lake Erie was Influenced by a Railroad in South Carolina - the Project Abandoned, and a Canal Advocated.
1448
Nov. 14 (UPI) — The city of Akron, Ohio, has agreed to reduce sewer overflows polluting the Cuyahoga and Little Cuyahoga rivers and the Ohio & Erie Canal, authorities said.
The settlement between the U.S. Justice Department, the Ohio attorney general’s office and the Akron City Council still must be approved in federal court, justice officials said in a statement Friday.
“These steps will improve water quality in the Cuyahoga River and its tributaries, protect public health, and enhance recreation and other public uses of the River,” the statement said.
The settlement calls for Akron to expand the capacity of its sewage treatment plant, reduce overflows from 32 sewer outlets, pay a $500,000 fine and provide $900,000 to remove a dam on the Cuyahoga River between Brecksville and Sagamore Hills Township.
The settlement resolves a lawsuit brought against Akron this year by the federal government and the state of Ohio.
Timothy
1449
1448-This will be very interesting to see who comes out on top of the power struggle keeping the dam active or its demise. By destroying the dam at the Pinery Feeder inlet will dry the scenic canal bed for several miles. Maybe Akron should figure out a way to quit pumping raw sewage into the Cuyahoga River instead.
1450- Nowadays there is so activity being done to preserve the rich past of our state and our canal systems, by removing that dam is taking away a part of its past. The removal is counter productive to historical preservation. Maybe the city of Akron should make the reparations for the countless decades they have used and polluted the river without monetary consequences lets leave the dam at Brecksville alone.
Akronite who's pissed off
1451- Removing the dam would have little to no affect on what comes from the sewage plant. If they're so head strong on removing these dams then I say take them all and don't be selective. Take them from the Portage Lakes, pull down the dam in the Gorge Metro Park and in Cuyaghoga Falls. What the heck, take down Hoover Dam too. We don't need any Damn Dams anyhow!!
Damn Dams
1452---John Charles Oswald of Swiss ancestry, was born in 1865 in Moravia. During his life, he lived in the far eastern end of the United States Military District Refugee tract on the western side of the Muskingum River south of the Treaty of Fort McIntosh and Greenville Treaty Line. Goshen was situated in this place, eventually ending up as Tuscarawas County after 1910 when the county was formed. Basically, Moravia was a settlement on the move because it drifted from place to place in a nomadic fashion, settling near missionaries. The Moravian people came from central Europe, the former Czech Lands, and settled into Ohio and Pennsylvania. John Charles Oswald’s grand- parents were the first to set foot in the new land.
I’m speaking of John Charles Oswald because of a story given by a minister I met at a wedding a week ago. Oswald was his great-grandfather. Oswald lived in Trenton now known as Tusci, short for Tuscarawas, and as the 19th century was closing out, worked using water from the Ohio and Erie Canal for his milling operation. He was known for having a single cylinder steam-operated engine which powered the machinery for cutting and devouring large trees using a long and large drive belt to transfer the power to the implement. His services included the clearing of acreage for farming. The cost of his services could get expensive, so compensation was paid by giving acreage for his part in clearing it.
This story was passed down at the wedding reception when the Pastor searched me out, knowing my knowledge of the former Ohio and Erie Canal. He wanted some answers about the Goshen area. During the event, we watched the dancing and commented about the ballroom style and how things were more innocent in those times when curtsies and bows were an everyday event. He went on to say that John Charles Oswald had to stay at a distance when he courted his fiancée Melissa, back in the 1880s by order of the religious beliefs of the Moravian Church. To assure that any hanky-panky was curbed, the two were kept at a distance without contact of any type. They were always chaperoned and to guarantee they didn’t even hold hands, a broomstick was used to keep them at a distance by each keeping both hands firmly planted on it. The two did marry and lived out their whole lives at Goshen. Both are buried at the Moravian Church Cemetery under the names of John and Melissa Oswald.
1453-- Which was first, the state or its governor?
1454 Trivia guy here's one for you. What's a "Yaller"?
1455= A "Yaller" was a brightly yellow in color rattlesnake based in northern Ohio.
Timothy
1456- The governor and judicial system was in place before statehood to place.
Timothy
1457-Canalwayman, is it possible that the timber rattlers and other venomous snakes and wolves could have made their back in our rural areas? Since your excursion back in 2005 have you stumbled on any more snakes?
Sabrina
1458 to 1457
Ohio has plenty of wild game roaming beyond the tree line within plain view of the local thoroughfares. Whatever they are, they see us easier than we can spot them. These animals have the ability to conceal themselves within the fields and wooded areas. Regardless of opinion, Ohio is loaded with rattlesnakes and I have stumbled upon several of them over the years. I can make the claim that I came across a “Yaller”. A Yaller is a yellow timber rattler who is in a color transition stage that will eventually end up grayish green at maturity. I have never crossed a wolf. I have crossed coyotes in Tuscarawas County running in a pack of four as I watched them disappear into a wooded area. In hindsight, when I was walking the canal and stayed out on my excursion years ago, I made mention of what I thought was scary animals or other things moving about my camp site keeping me a bit concerned. The location of camp near the Black Hand Gorge was actually set up on an Indian burial ground that I was oblivious to at the time. The property owner and I went over the history of that particular place and he assured me that Indian bones were exposed after a partial landslide caused by heavy rains in 2005 when the area of the Black hand Gorge was decimated by the onslaught of the Licking River rising sixty feet out of its banks. The bones were taken to the University of Ohio for examination and were never returned to their grave. I found that area to be somewhat eerie. The weirdest thing was those who lived away from mainstream of society as if they’re living in the 16th century and looked it. The Black Hand Gorge to the east of Toboso Road gave me cause for concern when a pack of mixed breed dogs that looked starved were silently stalking me through the winter brush in March of 2005. I crossed the freezing river at a still area and got out of harm’s way. I was so cold by the time I reached my truck I swore to wear deeper water waders or have some nearby. I went back into the camp area near the gorge a couple years later and found what I believe was out there that given night when I had a wild boar sizing me up. I ran for it. Ohio is over- populated with this oversized beast. I ran into a black bear while researching the Sandy and Beaver Canal.
1459----Some say that Captain John Raspin moved west into Ohio leaving the Erie Canal around 1845. The boat was named the “Phantom”, an early freighter built in New York. We cannot verify the boats by name or whether he was a captain. I found your list of all the known maritime names of canal boats but failed to see the Phantom listed. Can you or any others shed light here? What has us puzzled, how could a boat leave one canal system and get to another that’s separated by open water?
Rachel Raspin
Manhattan, NY
1460- Hey Canalwayman, The Canton Repository News paper ran an article about the placement of the bike and hike trail near Cleveland had to alter its course do to the poisonous chemicals that are left behind by the chemical companies, i read your scripts a couple years ago when you said to have gotten sick by being there doing research, what's your comments on this matter?
1461- I have never heard any mention of a Captain Raspin, although that doesn’t mean he didn’t exist. The canal boat named the “Phantom” was a real thing. I wish that I had more to go on and perhaps then I could be of more assistance - for instance, a time frame to work within. To be a captain wasn’t too difficult. Anyone could step up and be a canal boat captain. Any boat owner, company or mill, could hire and designate a captain. In the earlier years, there was no particular criteria in place or training of any sort to ply a canal boat on the Ohio and Erie Canal. Children often were at the helm or steer bar, namely a tiller bar, as well as the captain’s wife. A popular saying during the canal era was to address and greet one another along the waterfront as “captain”. For instance, one might greet another by saying “Hello there Captain.” That in itself was quite common to do. A good example of one calling another a captain is displayed in the case of Capt Pearl Nye who never really was sanctioned by the Canal Commission and was never listed as one, but was known as a captain. The state of Ohio tightened up on the loopholes and eventually required a designated captain for each boat in or around the 1850s. The state was loosing revenue with many boats falling into arrears in toll and taxes and had to make them accountable. Many boats often changed their names and captains could be found anywhere. An old boat with a fresh coat of paint with a new captain could slide by owing money to the state with the paint barely dry under another name. When the state leased the canal, everything went into disarray. The swindling was well-practiced by then, and deception ran it’s highest to avoid paying tolls when the state turned over its canals to six entrepreneurs who had no clue what they were getting themselves into. The boats which left the New York canals were either towed across Lake Erie or were of the kind with a mast which plied the eastern canals and were lake-worthy.
1462
to 1460-Cleveland’s chemical fields of the past have reared their ugly heads. Graselli Chemical along with the Sohio refineries was in a direct line with the former towpath of the Ohio and Erie Canal. Anyone who read this blog and my book also knows that I had brought out the fact that I had been sickened more than once just being in those areas. The Kingsbury Run section is where I’ve been hit the hardest by what’s in the ground. My throat swollen and the headaches lasted for days accompanied by other symptoms such as vomiting, I was poisoned.
1463--The masted canal boat was invented to be used on Lake Champlain, New York and Vermont's freshwater lake. Lake Champlain was situated on the northern branch of the Champlain Canal connecting with the Grand Canal at Troy to its south. These canal boats had the ability to set sail on open water as well as be tugged along the towpath.
1464 to 1463- The lake going canal boats were formerly known as Canal Schooners. These were unique vessels which could hoist their sails and set sail for all points. Once tried on both the Erie and Ohio & Erie Canal they met with difficulty with low bridge clearance situations. When the mast was folded it took up far too much cargo space and by that alone, it never caught on. Many schooner of this type were used on our Great Lakes but were hindered by the limited cargo space in comparison with a formidable schooner designed for lake travel.
July 16, 1995 a small piece of an article named "Archives" writtten by the Tuscarawas County Historical Society for the Times Reporter Newspaper.
The section of the canal that ran through Tuscarawas County was 109 miles in length, with 30 locks and a drop in elevation of 238 feet. It crossed the Tuscarawas River and the county line on an aqueduct north of Zoar. This section started at Summit Lake in Akron and extended into Dresden.
1466- Answering to the posting above without a number. We'll call it 1465. I would to have read the entire article and make corrections if needed. By posting only bits and pieces, only makes one think the remainder we don’t see is all good. From what's given here in posting 1465, isn’t much, we'll just have to work with that. The partial article should have clarified that this section of the canal in question was the southern slope coming down from the Portage Summit. If that was there intension, then the Wolf Creek lock 1 would mark the most southern point of the Portage Summit at mile 47, at Barberton, formerly known to be New Portage during the canal era. The bottom of the southern slope at the Muskingum River is Dresden Junction descending from Barberton. The Dresden Side Cut sits at canal mile 149 from the furthest point north at Cleveland. The distance from Wolf Creek to the Dresden Junction branch side cut is more along the lines of 102 miles rather than 109 as listed in posting 1465. Dresden sits 2.7 miles due south from where the mainline canal connected to its side cut. Dresden still has existing triple locks numbers 31, 32 and 33 in good condition.
The Tuscarawas Aqueduct was more westerly than north of Zoar, but it was on the Stark and Tuscarawas County line. If the section in question did begin at Summit Lake as indicated, the mileage would be about 109. For the overall, the wording is slightly confusing, but it's correct depending on the starting point. For those who are confused about the northern and southern ends of our summits and the numbering system, here we go; I’ll try to make it easy to understand. The Ohio and Erie Canal consist of 308 miles from Cleveland to Portsmouth which winds through Ohio heading in every direction over two summits. The Summits are the Portage and the Licking, the Portage being higher at 976 feet above sea level the Licking Summit at 897. Both summits have two locks starting with the number 1 on its two ends. From each of their lock 1s, the former canal descended to their bottoms while their numbers were ascending as they go. On the canal, the most northern slope, the Portage Summit descends from Akron at mile 38 north to mile 1 at Cleveland on the Cuyahoga River. The southern end of the Portage Summit as mentioned earlier ends at Adams Mill’s lock number 30 at mile 145. There we had a long level between both bottoms. Lower Webbsport lock number 19 is the bottom of the Licking slope. Ascending the northeast slope of the Licking Summit passes through some interesting places, one being the Black Hand Gorge and Newark then Heath and Buckeye Lake. Buckeye Lake was formerly the Old and New Reservoirs of the southern end of the Ohio and Erie Canal. Heath was the starting place of the Ohio and Erie Canal and where the first spade of dirt was removed at a ground breaking ceremony on July 4, 1825.
Going back to the bottom of both summits we have a six mile level from Adam’s Mills over to lock 19 Lower Webbsport lock 19. The elevation of that stretch is 731 feet above sea level. Dresden Junction at lock 33 sits at 700 feet at the Muskingum River. If one was to examine a canal map, it would portray a valley between the two bottoms. The climb of the Licking Summit is about 30 miles. The southern end of the Licking Summit was marked by King Watson lock number 1 at canal mile 195, another lock which was removed. The southern slope of the Licking Summit is about 113 in length containing 55 locks ending at West Portsmouth at a place called Alexandria.
1467---I would like to share a wonderful series of events that happened and forged the lives of many who followed. This story took place in the year of 1853,of my grandfather, the greatest man ever, whose life was drained from him through an unfortunate event and restored again through pure love at a time when us needed a special enduring love the most.
I am the oldest of three girls. We were traveling from Quebec to Ohio. My father was an engineer and was hired to a firm in the Massillon area. We bought a house in Moffat Heights. My mother was to give birth again. We were just two days in the area when my mother went into labor. Father went to find help but being new to the area, he didn’t get back in time. We lost mom and the baby. Father died inside along with her. His heart was destroyed. Mom’s last words to us were, “I’ll watch over all of you and send someone to help raise you girls. Until then, you have to take care of your dad.” I couldn’t believe my mom went that quick and I started growing up. I was eleven at the time. I helped dad so much. He tried to be a mom but didn’t know how.
Years had passed. My father was still handsome and a few women were interested in him. But it was me who had the final say in that. Mother told me she would send someone for dad and I was the most like her – I would surely know when she arrived. I am now sixteen-years-old and pretty like mom. Mom was sixteen when dad met her. Dad couldn’t look at me without tears but it brought back mom to his eyes.
Dad met a woman and I felt she was good for him. One day, she came to watch the younger ones. I was a woman now and was starting my life. I felt may be she was the one. Upon coming home, she had my sister crying, standing alone in the basement. “What are you doing?” I asked. “You kids have no discipline and that will soon change. Your father has asked for my hand in marriage.” “And who are you to decide if this is needed? How many children did you raise?” I asked her. “None, but I know how. “No you don’t. Leave now!” I said. She left and made a point of getting the first word into father. He never asked for my side of the story. She was gone that day. It was then that father claimed, “I’ll never look again. Your mother cannot be replaced. I will live on fine alone and I will always have all of you, so you see, I am happy.”
That night, I prayed, “Mom, have you forgotten about us? Didn’t you tell me you would
send someone for dad? Now is the time, so do it. He is so lonely and still young.” The next thing we knew, father had to go back to Quebec. He looked around for someone to look over us for one month. He placed articles in the paper looking for a sitter. We never expected this – out of nowhere came a small, pretty French-speaking woman. She was colorful and so pretty and after just walking through the door in our home, all of us girls just couldn’t pull ourselves from her. A feeling came over me. Mom waited and waited and delivered her as she told me she would years ago. My father was delighted to see this and could never imagine us giving so freely to another. She was the answer to a lot that this family needed. She was so pretty, it was hard to believe - like mom. Part 1
1467 -part 2-Part 2-Father left for Quebec. Upon his return, he noticed a change. Some of it he liked and some he would question. He paid her wage and they spoke for a while and she hugged and kissed us girls. I said to myself, “This isn’t happening. She is leaving us.” Father said her work was done here. We didn’t want her to go. He made his decision and she left, not wanting to. We felt it from her, she cried, and we watched her until she was out of sight. I was so angry for the first time with dad and none of us would speak to him at all. We wanted a mom and it was Cheree that we wanted. No one else would do. After a while, father agreed to find Cheree and maybe bring her back. She was gone as quick as she appeared! This struck father hard. Where did she come from? He started looking for her, for us and himself. Mom did deliver, dad sent her off. She was seen going south on the Ohio Canal. We followed her. Father got time off of work to look for her. She was easy to follow. All father had to do was describe her beautiful looks and we were going the right way. Father was falling in love and she was mom’s replacement and he knew it. His passion to find her opened him up and all the sorrow over mom was gone. We got to the Ohio River and it was busy down there at Portsmouth. She was boarding a river ship to return to New Orleans. We screamed for her. She heard us and came running to us. All of us held her tight. Then father took a step towards her and she asked him, “Are you lost?” He said, “How about coming home.” They kissed and we were jumping with joy, we were so happy! They were married soon after.
1468-Were the lock tenders always a fixture at the lock sites?
1469-Part1-As a slave in the south, it was hard living – some had it harder than others. In Winston Salem, North Carolina, I lived my whole life picking tobacco. Our master was good to all of us. He was sick and dieing. The new plantation owners were already coming through. They were different, just waiting to take over. Before master went on – that is Master O’Conners, he made arrangements to give several of us freedom papers to go and be a slave no more. It was 1859 and talk of the south giving up its slaves to freedom was everywhere, and soldiers were starting to form. The south was crying out for its men and wanting to divide the country with the south separate from the north. The north overtook the south in years to follow. The great south had come and gone. I stayed on the plantation. If I would have left during the war, I surely would have not made it. After the war, most slaves were told to leave but chose not to; but most conditions improved. From the north, surveyors would go from farm to farm to check conditions and make sure we were free to go. After a while, they quit coming and conditions turned back around. There were no more slave auctions or any of that but we were still the work force of the south.
Master O’Conners had a sister who he wrote in Scotland and asked her to come and make sure some of us got away. During the war, she stayed away. But in 1868, she made the venture over and was surprised to see most stayed on the farm. I was one of the men Master O’Conners wanted to go and make a new life in the north. I never knew my father and he was the closest I had to one. I could read and write and was a God-fearing man. Even to start my travels at that point in time would probably bring death. The southern man would kill any black man if they would be caught leaving the south. There were many stories of the blacks hanging from the trees. His sister spoke with me. She told me this, “Henry, one of my brother’s greatest wishes was to make sure you get into the northern states and I have made arrangements for a man to take you as far as the Ohio River. That’s just about five hundred miles north. He’ll be here tomorrow.” I have never felt such fear as I did when I first laid eyes on this man. He was a previous slave tracker. His eyes were cold blue and he was motionless. At the feet of his horse were two of the most vicious tracking dogs I had ever seen. He and the dogs were in perfect sync and as time goes on, they even began to think alike.
Master O’Conners’s sister paid the man in full and gave me 5 dollars in gold for every year of service at the farm. I had been there 27 years. We set out. I was on a donkey working our way north. We often would encounter resistance. My guide struck the same fear into them as he did all men and the dogs showed their long teeth when needed. We had been out a full month. We ate good. He would kill our dinner with only one shot and I would prepare it. On his horse were two rifles, one which was very long and had a stringy leather cover over it and a smaller shorter rifle and other gear. When the dogs were hungry, they went out into the woods to kill and whatever fell prey, screamed in fear and met death quick. It bothered me to know that the same dogs tracked us slaves at one time. It paid the same, dead or alive to return a slave. The dogs never once growled at me or even looked my way. If I were a slave, they would have known it. I could stray some; the dogs were obedient.
1469-Part 2-One evening, a bright glow was in the woods up ahead and we rode into a lynching party. A black man and two boys were hanging from a limb side by side and a woman and two young girls stood there screaming. We were just going right by. I looked at my guide and said, “Stop this.” He said, “It’s not my business, keep going.” I said, “No, I will help them.” I counted five men and two boys. The one boy pointed a gun directly at me. I heard a shot fired, the boy’s head just opened up. The others stood still as I cut down the three from the limb. My guide had his gun on them all. The one boy was alive. I heard another shot and the oldest man fell from a bullet through the head. At that point, any attempt on their part to do anything was useless. I helped bury the black man and his son. I said to the guide, “We must take this family with us.” “I agreed to only take you but I’ll make another pact with you. To do this, it will cost you all of your gold” he said. I agreed. Why not? He could have killed me at any time and taken my money – it would have been so easy. If felt that he was a man of his word. The woman opened up her purse to him also. The man said, “His gold is enough.” I didn’t know the black woman’s name but the girls were Milly and Girty and the boy’s name was Tobey. I had someone to speak with now. I heard three more shots ring out. “My God, what are you doing? Don’t kill these men!” I said. Three more fell dead. “If I don’t, they’ll be back and kill us later on” said the guide. Now seven men lay dead – five bad and two good. The two remaining men were begging for their lives and made promises not to follow. “Where are you from?” the two men asked. “Arkansas, and don’t forget it” said the tracker. Just for our safety, knowing these men would come with more to kill us, he took the other young boy as a prisoner, tied a rope around his neck and told the others he would release him in ten days with a gun and a horse. “I’ll kill if you follow” he said.
We started out again. The young white had a hate in his eyes that I have never seen before. His dad and brothers lay dead. People don’t think much about losing a life if its not one of their own. The guide made the young white into a slave to all of us. He fetched wood, killed for our food, did whatever needed done and the one dog was under orders and stared at the boy always. The boy was in great fear.
1469-Part 3-Days had gone by. The dogs came up to tell their master something was wrong and coming in the woods behind them. He pulled the young white to him and said, “One sound and the dogs will digest you. Everyone keep going and don’t turn around.” He drifted into the woods. It seemed like forever and then it came, a shot that sounded like lightning as it breaks across the sky and then the thunder. Time stood still, we were so afraid. Two more shots ripped through the trees. Silence fell again and then another series of other gun fire that was not as loud. The dogs were pointed in that direction and a low whistle came through the silence. The dogs bolted. The young white was shaking with so much fear that I put my arms around him – he was shivering. Death was all around us. The dogs found their mark. You could hear them killing the men, flushing them out like pheasants to be killed. All was quiet. Then the guide returned and said to the boy, “You’re free to go home.” The boy asked if he might come with us now. I said please. The guide said, “Do you understand why I took all of those lives?” “No, may be some day I will” said the boy. I feel that he just saved that young boy. From then on, it was pretty smooth. There was an occasional problem that came and went. We made it to the Ohio River. He took us across and we all ended up in the northern part of Ohio using the canal to get there.
I married the woman and we lived near Cleveland, had more kids and tried to live good lives. The boy stayed with the guide. I wanna say this – In the most evil of men, there is still some good and we got our money’s worth for sure. This story was passed down through the ages.
1470 to 1468--My information leans towards the lock tenders arriving on the scene during the 1838 season on the Ohio and Erie Canal. This change along the canal stemmed from the lack of courtesy and how some boatmen left the lock chamber after their use. The original design of our lock system was without a tumble spillway to assure the canal continually stays to its proper level. Instead, the water flowed through the lock wall to maintain depth on the lower level. The boatman was supposed to leave the upper valve in the open position and the lower paddle valve (wickets) in an open position to assure the canal stayed full. They often disregarded this general rule for one reason or another which could ground boats and cause disaster. Some locks still show evidence of having a by-pass valve built into the lock chamber. Those worked like windows in your home and could easily be regulated by moving a lever up or down that connected to the slide. A good example of this type of lock can be found at the Deep Lock in Peninsula and the Clinton Locks which also used this type of slide valve. Before 1827 the slides were the only way to maintain the canals level on the sections which were then completed. That's why generally you'll find these style locks up north on the first section from the north end of the Portage Summit to Cleveland and to the south on the second section completed into Massillon. Although, there are southern locks with these devices built into them. These locks were probably built before the design change, being wicket doors on each end of the chamber that are built into the gates. Every lock on this system is accompanied by an adjacent channel, be-it a tumble way of many designs. Some tumble ways drop the water over a block wall and some resemble sliding board. Because of the lack of concern by some boatmen before the lock tenders became a permanent fixture that was cause for great concern. This concern was either they kept the spillway doors out sync thus causing flooding and washing out the banks, or they ran canal ran dry. The answer came with the lock tender came whose job kept the canal locks functioning, and he controlled the manned spillways and weirs on his section. The proper name for the earlier lock mechanism was the (Lock chamber Culvert) which was an inner spillway built into the lock to fill the chamber and keep the canal full. The state could not rely on the boats men to keep the canal movement going with smooth continuity and that's why the lock tender became a vital part of the canal system.
1471
1470-Another spillway call it a tumbleway but designed to work more as weir was implemented on the Ohio and Erie Canal in its later days of operation. This was the last lock reconstruction ever to be done on the canal. Where was this located and what year was that done?
ACS
1472 to 1471.In October of 191, the Board of Public Works had to make a decision based on the recent flooding that washed the canal out in Tuscarawas County in that prior September. The Upper Trenton lock 15 was basically destroyed when the rushing waters from the Trenton Feeder directed the waters of the Tuscarawas River inland also damaging Lower Trenton lock 16s lower end at the connection of the feeder and the canal. The Upper Trenton lock was the last known repair on the system as far as I can tell.
1473- Was the canal around in the year 191?
1473 --- 1470-I would like to mention that lock 15 at Trenton was reverted back into a “well lock design” after the 1911 flood. You call it a lock chamber culvert. That design as you stated was the first design used until “27”. Spillways were invented for several reasons more than keeping the canal level going, one being to operate water wheels and milling machinery. Lock 15, has a wall resembling a weir the water toppled over and entered the well chambers below then into the confines of the lock chamber. Only the northern locks had well chambers built in.
1474 to 1473 about canals in year 191.Canals go back 4000 years before Christ arrived. The first documented canal was in Mesopotamia. In ancient China, large canals for river transport were established as far back as the Warring States (481-221 BC), the longest one of that period being the Hong Gou (Canal of the Wild Geese), which according to the ancient historian Sima Qian connected the old states of Song, Zhang, Chen, Cai, Cao, and Wei. That makes one believe the canal was around in year 191.
1475 to 1474-I disagree with the statement which says that only the northern locks had well chambers. You would probably find more of them up north on the Ohio and Erie Canal than anywhere else on its 308 miles. But, there were southern locks with the first design. Lock 15 in the Blackhand Gorge has well chambers. Lock 7 Lockport had a bricked up well port as does lock 50 in Portsmouth which has a bricked up well chamber.
1476- I've been over the canal over and over in the Tuscarawas County region and I cannot find what's so uniquie with Upper Trenton. I stringently dissagree with your findings on many points throughout this blog. ACS member
Lock 15 at Trenton / Canalwayman said...
1477 to 1476- I’m not going to give too much attention to the member of the American Canal Association who’s in disagreement with my work. Although I will say, either he’s blind, or needs glasses. I don’t believe that he or she has ever visited that site at Upper Trenton, because if so, they would agree with me. These days, I really don’t get too shaken up by some idiots who come on this site.
A spillway or any by-pass in connection to a lock is usually a channel designed to allow free flowing water from the canals higher level to its lower side. The weir or wall height of the spillway regulates the amount of water flowing around the lock chamber. Its name is frequently known as a tumble, a tumbles job is to keep the upper level at its designated depth. The spillway cannot do this job alone; it needs the assistance of other devices built into the canal system for help. The waste weirs and waste ways gauge the depth by having a set maximum depth built into them usually of no more then a few inches above the desired water depth. Waste ways are generally controlled by a lock tender that’s in charge of that level, waste weirs are automatic. Lock 15, at Trenton is different; this spillway is the only one of its type on the Ohio & Erie Canal in design only. Other locks work in the same manner but only looked differently. At lock 15, the water is directed over a wall falling into deep a well cavity. The bottom of it was constructed with wicket paddles controlled from above used in the same manner as the wicket doors built within the lock gates. Its movement was done by use of long rods reaching up where long wrenches, exactly the same as wicket wrenches controlled the action. Once opened the water rushed into culverts exiting in the lock chamber walls, but take note, the water entered the lock chamber inward of the upper doors and was used to either fill the chamber or to continue the slight current within the canal prism by regulating the lower wickets passing water through them. In some cases I have recently been told in conversation that the water continually flowed through the upper windows of the Whalen doors as does lock 2, in Akron demonstrates in these days and times. The windows are designed to keep the chamber from washing over the sides in high water conditions. The early years before lock tenders, I understand the window ports atop the door on both ends were used for canal continuance and through the years the design remained as flood control. I was told that bit of information in conference today about the ports in the doors, although, I find that scenario questionable about canal continuance through the ports. I can visualize them working as flood control much better.
1478---A millrace stretched from Lock 15 at Trenton and reentered the canal again below 15 above the feeder connection. Two mills operated on its millrace.
1479- I as you are deeply involved in the history of our canals here in Ohio. Now a long time enthusiast, I have accumulated dozens of pictures copied from the (Pockrandt Collection,SCHS). I feel there's a great inaccuracy with the information and placement of many of these pictures, especially locks. What's your opinion about this information which is a forefront of what's out there featured in several publications?
1480 to 1477. Where were the the wicket levers located in proximity with the lock chamber which operated these deep wells?
1480 to 1479. I’ve been asked over the last couple of years to go into people’s homes and identify pictures of locks and structures. In doing so, I was able to correctly put a number to many sites and give a name to the picture. Some of them, I wasn’t able to make neither heads nor tails of them. Who can say for certain some pictures are from our Ohio and Erie Canal. On the ones that I was clueless of, I left them alone, only to avoid the ridicule of being found to be wrong. Somewhere and somehow certain individuals who in their justification put numbers and names to questionable pictures to fill in book pages when actual pictures were unattainable at that time.
1481 Does anyone know about the Buffalo Lick Indian trail?
Cynthia
Buffalo Lick -- Canalwayman said...
1482 to 1481-The Buffalo Lick trail derived its name from the Indians who named it; they once lived in the region of today’s Buckeye Lake in Fairfield County. Years before the pioneers arrived here in Ohio, great hoards of buffalo roamed throughout Ohio and the Midwest. The Indians tribes survived on the buffalo and followed them in tow. The Buffalo Lick was an area more to the east of the former swamplands that made up the former Buckeye Lake, which was a product of the Ohio & Erie Canal by necessity. The Buffalo Lick swamp was an area of about 1/2 a mile wide north to south and about 3 to 5 miles in linear length east to west and was lined with swamp weed and filled with quicksand along its shoreline. The word Buffalo Lick was named when the Indians who lived in the region often hunted by the salt licks along the Licking River in waiting for the buffalo and deer to come and lick the salt outcrops as part of there diet. Licking County was named after the salt licks as well, calling it Licking County. Long ago, there was an old Indian Trail made by the buffalo which followed the Little Walnut Ridge, it served as a great advantage point for the Indian to hunt from higher ground. This trail today in part is Hill St. that runs through the center Waterloo, Ohio.
1483 - How did Canal Winchester acquire its name?
Tara
1484 to 1483-Winchester, Ohio sat in both Fairfield and Franklin Counties. This town was without a post office or in all actuality, a useable name. It was never recognized by the state without having postal service. This was a dilemma only because several other places within the confines of Ohio, be-it a town or village shared the same name. These other places were, Winchester, a small town, in Madison Township of Guernsey County, on the road from Cambridge to Cadiz. Winchester, a small town of Knox County, 9 miles south of Mount Vernon. Winchester, a small town on Anderson’s Creek, 7, miles from Xenia. Winchester, a small town in Champaign County. It wasn’t until 1841, before Winchester finally became Canal Winchester along with that, they had their own post office and after decades they finally were being recognized with a fixed name, all their own. Winchester was locked into a four decade battle with both Groveport and Waterloo who were both located either up and down the canal from Winchester. Although Groveport was also without postal service as well had to get their mail from Franklinton. Groveport was settled by the Rarey’s in 1812. Later on, during the canal era, Rarey’s Port named after Adam Rarey was a popular spot. The people from Winchester were angry from being denied a postal service and the other towns rubbed it in. A laughing and standing joke was when someone would ask where they were from and the responded Winchester, the response was which one. Winchester’s people were agitated and the towns people banned together and boycotted any dealings with both of those towns and done all their shopping and postal business at Lithopolis in retaliation. Even in the local taverns, fights were common when one from Winchester was teased when people would say, can’t you find a name for your town that’s not being used... In the end, Canal Winchester excelled beyond Waterloo in commercial trade and it would be a toss up who succeeded further between Groveport and Canal Winchester. It was twenty five years beyond 1841 when finally the village was incorporated. At conception, the town’s founder was Henry Dove. His son Rueben in the 1820s had a farm on the direct path of the upcoming Ohio and Erie Canal, who was against it passing through. He stood steadfast against it, but that changed with plenty of persuasion. Rueben finally allowed the canal to pass through his farm after a bitter dispute with the state, but he listened to their offer. It wasn’t until after all the facts were laid out on this matter and only then when Rueben could see the monetary potential of this endeavor he gave it the right of way. After a brisk down payment from the state to cover cost of brush removal and digging etc, he was all in favor of the canal and the village of Winchester, Ohio was soon born along the canal. The Doves had no idea that they would be denied postal service and were oblivious at the time of giving their settlement a name that other towns by the same name existed in 1803. The father Henry hailed from Winchester, Virginia, and named his land plat the same here in Ohio. He and family were skilled craftsmen who attracted other pioneers and soon enough they moved into close proximity of his small mercantile and trading post where he and his family thrived in Franklin and Fairfield County. The canal brought them great prosperity. Canal Winchester had not one canal lock in town, but two more to the west; they were locks 19 and 20. Groveport hadn’t a lock in town as well because both locks 22 and 21, sat east of town.
1485- I was recently told that Manchester of Summit County was formerly the stage route called Massies Station.
Leonard
1486-Manchester is a village in Adams County, Ohio,along the Ohio River. Manchester Township lies within Summit County, not the same. Massie's Station was the first permanent settlement in the Virginia Military District of the Northwest Territory in the years after the American Revolution. It was laid out along the Ohio River in 1790 near three islands. Native Americans used these islands to attack settlers traveling down the Ohio River. Numerous people lost their lives in these attacks. The community was named after Nathaniel Massie, an explorer and entrepreneur who helped survey the Virginia Military District. Massie offered nineteen men property if they would settle in the town. He used the settlement as a base for his survey work in the district. In 1791, Massie's Station became known as Manchester, Ohio. Massie named the community after Manchester, England. It was the fourth permanent settlement established in the Northwest Territory. By 1791, residents had completely encircled the community with a stockade to provide protection from Native Americans. This was the last town in what would become Ohio to be enclosed with fortifications. Manchester served as the county seat for Adams County from 1797 to 1803, when residents moved local government to West Union.
1487-Mr.Maximovich We wish to commend you on behalf of all those who appreciated the effort you brought forth at your exhibit last evening at Canalways Center.
1488= Can you pin-point where the Katydid Bridge was located somewhere on the Ohio and Erie Canal?
1489-A Katydid Bridge was a design more than a specific name given to an individual structure. How it acquired that name comes from New Jerseys Somerset County’s Katydid Bridge design. The design was prominent on the Morris Canal system. The Morris canal out-lived the Ohio and Erie Canal and its structured were above standards by comparison. The design became very common along all of Ohio’s canals. A Katy Bridge had a high arch with a plateau of about forty feet and was anchored with block abutments known to be one of the first truss designs ever recorded on Ohio’s canal systems.
1490--Katybridge goes back much further than New Jersey. Once I visited Scotland and Ireland where a Katybridge is a standard design with some dating back over a thousand years.
1491-hey Canalwayman, why is the canal bed empty at Canal Fulton this date March 13,10?
1492 to 1491--Today would be a good example of canal bank damage prevention used now and through the canal era. After a heavy snowfall this past winter and the rapid rise in temperature over the last week, this caused considerable flooding and river swelling. I jumped in the car and took a short drive into Canal Fulton and found the canal barely running. Knowing the area well, the only place further down that could relieve the swollen canal would be at lock 4. Just as I suspected, the upper wickets of lock 4 were open at a 1/4 turn. That’s more than enough to empty the canal and stay ahead of the rushing waters entering up north. Below the lock on the Massillon level, the canal was running out of its banks for miles crossing over the towpath and the Tuscarawas River was higher than the canal, which causes feedback into the many spillways on that canal level. The rather long weir just north of Canal Fulton at North Corporation was gushing water into the canal bed north of Fulton. Just up the canal at Lake Lucerne at the Nimisila Feeder connection to the canal, the water was rushing into the canal and the canal was unable to use its weir as it was designed because the river was rushing into it. If the upper wicket doors at lock 4 weren't left open, Canal Fulton could be in jeopardy of flooding. That's why the canal is empty at Canal Fulton on this day.
1493-I'm certain a weir exist between Canal Fulton and Lock 4 which has the capability of emptying the canal.
LARRY
1494 to 1493 That may had been the case during the canal era, but today in order to drain the Canal Fulton level it has to be done by use of lock 4. To my knowledge to only other connection to the river between town and the lock is only at the McLaughlin Dry Dock. But I may be missing something, who knows?
1495 I was under the impression that the earliest canal boats were built and transported over from Scotland , is this true?
1496 responding to 1495- At the anticipation and hype of the grand opening of the Ohio Canal many boats were redirected from the Erie Canal to the Ohio Canal on loan from New York up until boat building facilities were established. To the contrary many stayed here and cut out a better living. To say that a boat was towed or hauled from Scotland is sorta far fetched.
1497-In the very beginning of the Ohio and Erie Canal, most of the boat building and repair docks were situated in the canal’s most northern 100 miles from Zoar to Cleveland. Several years separated the completion of the northern end and the canal’s total completion at Portsmouth. As the canal was being completed on the system’s southern counterpart, the dry docks were being developed as well. At the very conception and when the canal was finally approved by the state legislation, boats immediately were being brought across Lake Erie from Tonawanda and Buffalo to be the first to be put into service at the opening of the Ohio and Erie Canal. The first boatyard and drydock were built in Akron at locks 2 & 3.
1498--Are there any factories left in today's world that rely on water of the Ohio & Erie Canal for industrious usage?
1499-“Canal reservoir” means any artificial lake or impoundment created by a dam that was constructed to provide water to any canal system in this state. The canal reservoirs are Buckeye Lake. East Reservoir, Forty Acre Pond, Grand Lake St. Marys, Indian Lake, Lake Loramie, Long Lake, Nesmith Lake, Nimisila Reservoir, North Reservoir, Summit Lake, Tuscarawas River Diversion Dam Reservoir, and West Reservoir.
1500 -to- 1498-Today, there’s not much left by comparison to the old days when so many industries depended on the hydraulic water power and water for steam to operate machinery. On the entire canal today, we may have only 40 or so miles left which are still watered, of that, I can only think that Cargill Salt Industries at canal mile 41 or 42 who depend on the canal. Cargill extracts water to be boiled and forced into the deep mines where it captures the salt and rises it up. Cargill uses that process to recapture the steam in evaporative coolers and collect the salt. The old B.F.Goodrich complex at Canal Place may use canal water as well or quit doing so recently. Back in the canal era, the waters from the canal turned many water wheels throughout our state calling this water source hydraulic power. Water power was a vital part in our states earliest growth because it turned machinery and gearing to operate the mills. Before the canals became a part of Ohio’s industrial growth, mills were more or less in desolate places, confined to streams only with the exception of the horse drawn mills where the horse or mule be-it walked in circles turning the axle. Canals made it possible for a more controlled way of milling using the managed canals rather than unpredictable rivers which could go either from flood stage to barely a trickle. The way the canal where designed, they had to pass water overtop or through a tumble, weir or lock to continue its levels, the waters always flowed down. As still as the water seemed, the canal surely had a current. The water was never wasted in the process to keep the depth and the mills operated as long as enough water was available to run the canal. The previous posting names several reservoirs and lakes here in Ohio that were used in there capacity to assure an abundant supply of ready water was at hand. That list posted needs some slight tuning. Nimisila Reservoir wasn’t built until the 1930s. Summit County Ohio has many other reservoirs built within the canal era which were not listed. Parts of the Tuscarawas River Diversion Dam Reservoir and West Reservoir are a part of the Portage Lakes which date back into the canal era. After a close examination of the several dams which make up this series of Portage lakes dams, some have dates which coincide with the era. The Firestone Country Club dam on Harrington Rd. was built in the 1830s to assist the Ohio & Erie with the coming of the P & O Canal. Springfield Lake of Summit County is a natural body of water as well which assisted the P&O and the Ohio and Erie Canal by having a stream called the Little Cuyahoga that service the P&O and also having the Tuscarawas River leading off from it that filled the Portage Lakes. I could go on for a week naming all the water supplies that were implemented as reservoirs for our canal systems on the eastern side of the state. We have other experts who know the western canals much better who could voice an opinion about the reservoirs over there.
To 1499 & 1500.
Entry 1499 pretty well listed the reservoirs constructed for the Miami & Erie canal on the western side of the state. At the time that they were built, Indian Lake was referred to as the Lewistown Reservoir. Grand Lake St. Marys as the the Mercer County Reservoir or Grand Lake.Loramie Lake-The Loramie Reservoir. When built, the Mercer County reservoir was the largest artificial body of water on planet earth. 40 Acre pond north of St.Marys represented an impoundment of a canal re-located St.Marys River & did provide a small supply of water to the canal as it descended to Toledo. The southern & northern ends of the M&E were also augmented by feeders off of the Great Miami & Maumee Rivers.--W.A.Seed
1501-- The feeders of the M&E were ST.Marys Feeder,Dry Feeder,Loramie Reservoir Feeder,Sidney Feeder,Trot Dam,Mad river,Miamisburg.
1502-1501 You left out the Warren County Feeder as you have the Middleton Dam & Feeder and I fail to see a Trot Dam & Feeder, it's the Troy Dam & Feeder.
1503 Please do not use the ampersand when titling a listing.
To 1501 & 1502-
Since a discussion listing M&E reservoirs expanded into one involving its feeders I'll add a couple more. First off, the Loramie, St Marys, and Sidney feeders were simply direct, or in the case of Sidney indirect channels from the reservoirs to the main canal (Sidneys fed the Lewistowns surplus water to the Great Miami river which had a dammed feeder 7 or 8 miles downstream that channled the water via a navigable feeder to the M&E at Lockington). There was another dammed feeder at Lock 8S north of Pigua (south of Lockington) that watered the canal south to the Troy dam.
The canal was also fed north of Defiance at several spots on the Maumee- Independence and Grand Rapids (Providence). Both locations were where the canal used the slackwaters from the dams to navigate on the river for short distances. The Great Miami was utilized at least 4 times for water, the Maumee twice, The Mad river once--W.A.Seed
1504-Which was the feeder at Lockbourne, the Gahanna River or the Columbus Feeder? After all, aren't the two the same stream?
1505 to 1504-The Columbus Feeder was an extension of the Scioto River built for two reasons, they were to supply water to the Ohio and Erie Canal and make a connection with the state capital by way of canal. The feeder is totally separate from Walnut Creek. Walnut Creek in sections had different names, for instance the Big Belly Gahanna section began at Gahanna and ended at the Franklin and Pickaway County line. Other names for Walnut Creek were originally Indian Names; two of them were Whingwy Mahoni Sepung & Menkwi Mhoani Siipunk. To add to this list is the Big Belly Creek, Gahanna River, Big Lick Creek and Hayes Ditch and there are probably more if we would look. The first of the Indian names translate to Big Buffalo Belly and the other means close to the same as Wide river like Buffalo, which I cannot confirm that.
1506- Was Columbus Ohio always the seat of Franklin County?
1507 Columbus, Ohio was founded in the same year the decisive battle took place on Lake Erie, the same year when Commodore Perry once and for all, defeated the English Navy. The great war of 1812 was being fought as well in the same year. Franklinton was the first of two to hold the county seat of Franklin County and held that position for about 15 years. Franklinton was plagued by yearly flooding by the Scioto River and its fertile soil wasn’t enough by itself to keep the pioneers and settlers interested. The Scioto River was barely to the east of Franklinton and bordered it on the north as well. Franklinton was settled on the western bank of the river. This sharp bend in the river caused extensive damage during high water conditions. Columbus was better placed and slightly higher in elevation, and on that note alone, it was developed. Throughout the years, Columbus swallowed up all of the neighboring communities including Franklinton. Franklinton withered away as they vacated the seat of justice while Columbus acquired the county seat. Franklinton was one of our earliest settlements founded in 1797. The political arena of Franklin County put up a strong fight trying to retain its county seat but the opposition was just too strong to move it. The Olentangy River as well as the Scioto River had countless mills running simultaneously with many inlets and mill races that crossed the landscape on the eastern and southern sides of the two rivers from higher ground. There were so many mills operating, this caused a war between the millers who fought for the most northern land within close proximity of town. Land along the river’s eastern bank experienced a price explosion and its real estate went sky high. The first and most productive businesses known to Columbus were of course the grist mills. Secondary to them was real estate during the early years, but that soon changed. By sinking roots, making the state capital stationary, this bolstered the real estate market. By finalizing the state capital as Columbus, this set the wheels in motion for that once small post town to flourish into a megatropolis. Zanesville and Chillicothe as well as Columbus were all once the state capitals of Ohio.
1508 Akron as Columbus inherited the county seat which was first Ravenna when Portage County stretched to Wayne County. The name "Portage" comes from an old Native American path called "Portage Trail", which ran between the Cuyahoga and Tuscarawas rivers, where travelers portaged their canoes. The location of the trail today is within the boundaries of neighboring Summit County. Summit County is a by product of Portage County.
1509- I was recently told that the Shuster Grist Milling Operations at Canal Fulton was operated solely by the hydraulic power supplied by the O & E Canal. My argument is that Mudbrook supplied its water. Yes or NO?
1510 -to- 1509-If the Schuster Mill sat at lock 4 on the southern end of the Portage Summit at mile 56, it would be powered by the hydraulic power supplied by the Ohio and Erie Canal. Being that it is a bit south of the lock towards Massillon and wasn’t situated entirely on the canal it was powered by another source of water. There were several mills which operated in the area used the power offered by Mud brook’s running water. The Schuster Brewery operated from the late 1880s to 1925 until a fire closed its doors. This fire was very suspicious to the stock holders and the insurance policy holders alike. The brewery was financially in the rears and was running at a loss after the canal closed, but during its canal days there were several stock holders and other interest involved in the brewery operation. James Duncan and Joseph Baumeler from Zoar had interest once while it was a flour mill that also prepared grain for the brewery at Zoar.James H. McClain of Massillon set the brew house in. After the mill burned another mill was built near named Smith Mill which turned out Wheat corn and barely products and was well known for its cider press. This mill was erected in 1925 and stands today. The Schuster mill was driven by the waters of both Mud brook and Crystal Springs which were tied together once. Several reserve lakes where dug out with many canals being dug to assure and abundant supply of water was at hand for Smith Mill and the previous Schuster Mill. To take a drive along High Mill Rd. you can view some of the canals that were dug out between the lakes. Many of the canals were originally mill races leading to the Tuscarawas River. These races had to be widened to carry more flow when several more mills began sitting up on Mud brook and Crystal Springs. Because of the abundance of millers who settled I, the area picked up the name of Millport that become a hot spot along the Ohio and Erie Canal There is another Millport in Southern Ohio also situated on the canal too. Millport thrived when taverns opened with hotels and a train station soon followed and when they struck coal at Bridgeport and the neighboring mines the whole region expanded. Interesting enough, following either of these streams on foot reveals the old foundations of mills going back 2oo years. Don’t be confused and think that the Massillon Brewing Company was the same operation, it wasn’t. The Massillon Brewery operated on the opposite side of the river in Patagonia by Christian Schott and a shady saloonist who had more saloons then the other entire saloon operators combined in Massillon and Canal Fulton. Smartly enough all of these bordered the waterfront the other name is Julius Whittman. From stories that I heard, both men were part of a small organized crime network which had the local police doing all their dirty work, that hasn’t changed much through the years! Prostitution was a big business back then and brothels stretched out through Cuyahoga, Summit, Stark and Tuscarawas Counties, Summit County having the most of them. Drugs and opium where sold over the counters at most of the saloons throughout the entire Ohio and Erie Canal. The waters from the Ohio and Erie Canal never turned the wheels at the mills at Crystal Springs or Millport on the mill at lock 4.
Hello Jeff.., I wish to start by saying we finally had the opportunity to meet you on our tour; some of us were overwhelmed with your knowledge. It quickly becomes apparent you’re an expert on the subject when members gravitate in your direction when you open up spilling information. We, my wife and I, were often told that you were a bit smug, but we never had such an impression over the last couple of days. This web-page here shows a deep dedication and a love for the canal and just by your expressions and the strong will that you readily demonstrate for accuracy makes you as an individual who stands out separate from the others. Some of us would like to coordinate a special outing with you heading it up and go over some aspects in relationship with the region along the Tuscarawas River. I found the story of Morning Star extremely fascinating, perhaps we can go up there. For the record, you are absolutely correct by saying that the slide show of Mr. Woods pertaining the Hilton State Dam being made of concrete is inaccurate. Further more, after our outing today we took a minute and rolled back into New Philadelphia to check out for ourselves the slide show for accuracy on the subject of the Hilton Dam…... Parking at Buehlers as you suggested and with an easy walk we found the terminus of the Lateral Canal were you said it would be. In doing so, we witnessed for ourselves what Terry Woods claims are to be is inaccurate without rebuttal. His slide show of the dam at the Trenton site is none other the dam that sits next to Mill St in N. Philadelphia behind the electric company.. How you did ever come to that conclusion alone, when the full forces of the CSO’s best researchers are naive to it??? What’s your email?
1512-Part 1-In reply to the previous posting we'll call it 1511. My Email is canalwayman@yahoo.com, you probably could have found that somewhere on my web-page.
I wish to stress this point, I'm not trying to attack Mr. Woods work at all, its no secret that we disagree about the location of the concrete dam that so many believe to be the Hilton Dam. If retaining the historic wealth of our canal is so important it would be served much better to at least to be accurate in doing so.
I had a great time the last couple of days and I finally went face to face with many great canal enthusiast who over the coarse of the last few years we had grown to known each other via my webpage.
There will always be disagreement when history is involved; everyone has their opinion which sets the stage for debate. Some guys do not want to know the truth and some others take the credit for others hard work. It’s no secret that I found the lock on the Trenton Feeder years ago and posted it about three years back. I passed it on to others who then became instant experts about an area they had no clue of before it was located. I have walked every inch of Stillwater Creek to Eastport and Uhrich’s Mill and then some. I walked both sides of the river from Gnadenhutten to Dover and then some. I found unexplained dams up on Stillwater Creek and claim that another lock may exist in the area on the other side between Stillwater Creek and the Tuscarawas.
Bear this in mind about the Trenton Feeder and Its name; it’s simply named the Trenton Feeder because that’s what it was built to do. I haven't yet found that area to be called the Hilton combo Trenton Feeder Dam. The name Hilton was derived because somewhere along the vast Hilton tract a dam was either erected or rebuilt probably for a mill long ago. There are indications that a dam was erected between Trenton and New Philadelphia on the Tusc. Bear this in mind also; there are a couple of more inlets down river which plugged directly into the Trenton Feeder. According to available documents, the Hilton Property bordered both the canal and river alike. If the dams were in fact rebuilt at the Trenton site than why don't we have the remains of a Portland concrete dam? There's not even a trace of the dam in the picture that is suppose to be there. I actually was in the water there during a drought six years to see for myself at the Trenton site and I rested myself against rotted timbers, not cement. That slide show picture is the dam up river next to Mill ST. Not at Trenton.
Part 2- I can say with great accuracy that I'm correct when the subject are these dams and I know why the dam was placed in town in the first place. In obtainable maps, one can clearly find the ferry crossing that worked between Lockport and New Philadelphia, along with it, Ferry St. If you cannot locate these I will send you a copy proving it. To operate the ferry a dam was placed barely down river, by doing so it creating a slack-water, no explanation needed why. The dam was rebuilt by the Daley Brothers from Bolivar early in the Twentieth Century; I have no clue to which the original builders were. I can say that I have been invited into the home of the descendants of the Daley Brothers on several occasions that live close at hand in doing so and I had privy information that others hadn't ever had the experience to see. These people were guided to believe that the dam in question was the Trenton Dam by a well known researcher who’s often wrong in his work, I might add who claims others work as his own. I immediately told them other wise when they asked my opinion and told them where to find that exact spot today at Mill St..
I went over this scenario today with a enthusiast and remarked to him that the reports have been known to be wrong before, giving lock 4, at Canal Fulton as a reference because the reports say otherwise than the Daley Bros building it. He looked at me and said that's not true, it was lock 5. This is what I'm talking about, and this is what one deals with. Does one argue every point? No, that gets tiresome?
I wish to go on record and say that I had a good time over the course of the last couple of days, but I'll be honest, a lot of what I was hearing was good and some was questionable, many key points of interest were passed over for lack of knowledge. I never once heard mention of Bluebell Island or the mill that sat on the fork of the Lateral with its outlet at the Tusc which can still be identified. Our hotel was bordering the Lateral Canal and not a discussion whatsoever developed from it. The one who was in charge declined my request to take out just one minute on the way to Trenton and in doing so I would have shown him the real dam that was on the slide show was actually here in New Philadelphia. He didn’t want to know the truth.
Just for my sake and to keep up and continually add to my knowledge overall, I take out one day a week and pour myself into a fact finding mission picking various locations over the 308 miles of the Ohio and Erie Canal. Right now, I’m on a mission to locate actual mile markers, if they existed at every mile, I’ve found only one so far.
I attended the tour and can say it was rather incomplete on the information aspect to say the most. It seems as if many were competing to stress their points of view. It didn't take long to figure out that its you who was the commander of the technical configurations and workings of the system. Why haven't you already began doing tours?
Hello and the pleasure was ours meeting you. Thank you for signing our book. The tour was very inadequate on the information end. There seems to be a lack of knowledge, basically nothing was brought out that was anything more than speculations except for your interpretation which reasonably made the most sense. This website says it all, we have posted here for years now and in doing so have learned more, every query has be satisfied. We also visited the dam at Mill St. yesterday and are in agreement that it’s truly the one on Woods slide show, but the placement is wrong on his part. The Trenton Dam is not one in the same. Is Woods even aware of this dam up stream?
We weren't too impressed listening to all of the army stories and the babbling on by the director doing the affair. I felt this short jaunt was ill prepared and fell short by leaving the technical side alleviated from its content. This tour lacked desperately in the field of usable knowledge. How about them stating facts for instance, who built the lock or the original contractor back in 1825, whose property it may sit on then, or a good canal story would have been appropriate. We were shuffled around like cattle on hot buses and had a crummy lunch. We have been on other tours which were really something to talk about. Tours put on by those who represent the CSO doing the Ohio & Erie Canal are full of loop holes and left me with no-more knowledge than I arrived with, more confused, although a sore rear end and the taste of a bad turkey sandwich rather than a descent meal left a great lasting impression. Thank you for directing me to this site, I sat up all evening going over it. There is a lot of useful stuff in which I hadn't been aware of, nice job. Have you considered joining the CSO? They really do need someone like you who has done such an historic thing. By the time we had talked the first minute, I knew that you were on your game. I’m the lady who asked for you to sign my book because I heard you were coming along and I remember the Plain Dealer week end review magazine article which hi-lighted your adventure. You should run for office as the president of the CSO!!
Approx 1519
To Jeff- It was a pleasure to actually meet. I hope your opinion of the tour was better than some of the previous ones. Personally,I thought that some of your theories regarding the canal in Tuscarawas County could be valid & deserve further investigation.
That said, I didn't hear one person dismiss what you said out of hand. The CSO encourages its members to explore & find information that adds to everyones knowledge of the canal system. For what its worth, I (as well as others) think you made some good points regarding the Hilton Dam site.
To the previous entry- I liked the Turkey sandwich. We've had worse luncheon meals on a tour.--W.A.Seed
Hello W.A.Seed. Once again things sorta roll out of hand on this site. I would discourage anyone else from posting any more negative listings. I thought the sandwich was good personally and everyone I met was very nice and mannerly. If anyone was noisy and outspoken it was probably me.I have never been on a canal tour before so I can't judge it against anything else. But I had a good time for certain. It meant alot for me to meet you and David Hayslip and my opinion of you two is very high up the scale of just good old boys. I hate looking at this site and seeing people acting like children and whiners. I thought it was a good outing and will certainly attend the rest of them.
1521-A ferry operated at the Ferry St. Landing and was owned and operated by William Blake until 1837, it closed down with the completion of the Lateral Canal. Blake and Deardorff were locked into a battle which was taken to the grave. The dam in question was placed on the river and funded by William Blake who owned the land on the southeastern rim or the Tuscarawas River for miles seized the opportunity to cash in on the canal charging huge fees to ferry goods in and out of New Philadelphia. Back up stream in Dover Christain Deardorff built two bridges which angered Blake taking business away from the ferry. These bridges were north of New Philadelphia and crossed the big river in two different places able to maneuver around the ferry. Deardorff charged a heavy toll to those living opposite the river in Blakesfield. Blake funded and built the dam in 1817 which was then later rebuilt at Mill St in or about 1904 to 07.
1522-To those of you who had such an unpleasantly time while on the tour, I have this to say. The main body of those who attended enjoyed themselves. The bus, carts, bakery items, meeting hall etc-etc all cost money. Turkey or ham, what does it matter, you had something to tide you over until dinner! Some people just enjoy complaining. I thought the tour went exceptionally good. The worst part of the weekend was being tortured by the never ending redundant speech given by Ralph Regula who enjoys listening to himself. He surely has a long arm to continually pat his own back. I didn’t vote for him. His story about the separatist was a bit altered away from the facts as they were. Larry Turner does get off on a tangent too often sliding in and out of his army experiences when the topic at hand is the canal. Never the less, the man has devoted years of service without payment to bring the history of the Ohio and Erie close to those who had the inkling to hear about our rich history along the canal. This work is voluntary, no one punches a time clock, and it’s done through love and devotion of a transportation route which opened up Ohio, our home. Mr. Woods is an encyclopedia of knowledge about the Ohio and Erie and our other canals here at home. He’s not always correct, then again who is? Terry has it wrong about the dams. The dam on debate here sits up river in New Philadelphia at Mill St. Trenton may reflect on paper or in the reports as being reconstructed of Concrete, it surely wasn’t. Confusion will always loom on this subject only because Woods listed it incorrectly and his followers believe his every word as canal gospel. The newer generation of canal enthusiast is arriving and we old timers will fade away soon, all of the great researchers have already died or are in close line to go. It will be a sad day when Jack Gieck leaves us. Mr. Maximovich we know as Canalwayman is also one of the great researchers who obviously has the same dedication and drive it takes to be in the same classification as the big names. To walk the canal from head to toe was a great undertaking and you have never been blessed properly for this achievement. Join our group and enhance us with your strong knowledge and be part of something of great importance.
1523-Every one who’s involved, culminating together, pulling the same direction, can change speculations into facts. I will soon become an active member and stemming from that, can stretch my own knowledge base further.
The other day down along the river, was a throw-back into time, a time that was plagued with disease and death. Those two real-life events sadly worked hand in hand in digging the canal. Malaria ran rampant and we as a group, were being severely overcome by mosquitoes while standing at the lock buried deep in the woods along the Tuscarawas River. Mosquitoes were an obstacle which was never overcome during the construction of the canals nor in the far east, during the many wars this country has been involved in. In modern days, we have quinine. Back then while building the canals, one had only hope that he may get through it alive. It is no secret why a jigger of whiskey was given to the men. That bottle of relief meant a lot to a person who was in pain and would allow one to sleep more peacefully while being in a drunken state. If it wasn’t for the whiskey distributed by the state, the canal would have never pushed through. That jigger made men forget about their miseries. But as a whole, we did experience an onslaught of mosquitoes along the canal which directly reminisced with the canal era.
1524-while the boat worked down the towpath the skinners and beast alike at least had the comfort of the canopy overhead to block out the hot sun. Horse flies were among the greatest of nuisance leaving welts. The animals often took off in a furry and jumped into the canal for cover.
1525 to 1524- The canopy came later on because all of the trees were cleared in the early days in order to place the canal and towpath. To be more specific, if the sun was directly overhead, the chance of being hit by the sun’s full strength was good, and in the summer months, towpaths were smoking hot. If one was so lucky to be crossing the state by canal from Port Washington to Groveport, you probably had the sun bearing down from dawn till dusk. Going through the deep wooded area of the Black Hand Gorge would have been hidden from the suns rays and probably a relief.Going north to south or vice versa, you were only hit by the mid morning to mid afternoon sun’s rays, and that is where the canopy would work, supplying a shadow with the sun’s angle beyond the trees. There’s nothing worse than being bitten by a horsefly - they leave massive swollen welts. Mosquitoes and poison ivy became deadly. Poison ivy being misused and discarded wrongly killed too. We all know that have I dwelled on this poison ivy subject before. A little more won’t bore us too badly. Malaria was one of the many killers that took lives slowly as the men grew weaker and weaker through time. It was a slow death known as the ‘shakes’ along the canal. Cholera, blacktongue fever, smallpox and other airborne diseases killed swiftly. Smoke worked the best at ridding the pesky bugs and there was plenty of green brush and shrubbery to throw on top a good fire. A common practice used then was burning brush, not knowing the dangers with it being laced with poison ivy and then placing it upwind from the work area where the smoke drifted into the work place. It worked very well at removing the mosquitos. At night, the workers kept a good brush supply around and threw it on the fire throughout the night to ward off mosquitos. Back in those times, they were clueless to the fact that the smoke was loaded with histamines that caused massive eye irritation, closed their throats and blisters broke out throughout there lungs and bronchial tubes and on the outside, the men scratched, breaking the skin, allowing infection to enter. The body was infected from the inside out, and to complicate things, the symptoms mimicked pneumonia and they soon died. The work areas were usually swampy and the places along the rivers were a haven for biting insects.
1526-We finally found this story section of your webpage. Can you publish some actual canal related stories? I expected more of them than having to read the more technical side which can be boring.
1526- The prior listing is a great interpretation of the tragic events which took diggers lives, how about reptiles, are they also just as responsible for the taking of life? We took out a few minutes and visited the Mill St. site yesterday, after which concluded that a misidentification has taken place concerning the dams name and location. Do you have any canal stories be fiction or real time?
This is in response to the article in the Repository. I would like to share a wonderful series of events that happened and forged the lives of many who followed. This story is of my grandfather, the greatest man, whose life was drained from him through an unfortunate event and restored again through pure love.
I am the oldest of three girls. We were traveling from Quebec to Ohio. My father was an engineer and was hired to a firm in the Massillon area. We bought a house in Moffat Heights. My mother was to give birth again. We were just two days in the area when my mother went into labor. Father went to find help but being new to the area, he didn’t get back in time. We lost mom and the baby. Father died inside along with her. His heart was destroyed. Mom’s last words to us were, “I’ll watch over all of you and send someone to help raise you girls. Until then, you have to take care of your dad.” I couldn’t believe my mom went that quick and I started growing up. I was eleven at the time. I helped dad so much. He tried to be a mom but didn’t know how.
Years had passed. My father was still handsome and a few women were interested in him. But it was me who had the final say in that. Mother told me she would send someone for dad and I was the most like her – I would surely know when she arrived. I am now sixteen-years-old and pretty like mom. Mom was sixteen when dad met her. Dad couldn’t look at me without tears but it brought back mom to his eyes.
Dad met a woman and I felt she was good for him. One day, she came to watch the younger ones. I was a woman now and was starting my life. I felt may be she was the one. Upon coming home, she had my sister crying, standing alone in the basement. “What are you doing?” I asked. “You kids have no discipline and that will soon change. Your father has asked for my hand in marriage.” “And who are you to decide if this is needed? How many children did you raise?” I asked her. “None, but I know how. “No you don’t. Leave now!” I said. She left and made a point of getting the first word into father. He never asked for my side of the story. She was gone that day. It was then that father claimed, “I’ll never look again. Your mother cannot be replaced. I will live on fine alone and I will always have all of you, so you see, I am happy.”
That night, I prayed, “Mom, have you forgotten about us? Didn’t you tell me you would
send someone for dad? Now is the time, so do it. He is so lonely and still young.” The next thing we knew, father had to go back to Quebec. He looked around for someone to look over us for one month. He placed articles in the paper looking for a sitter. We never expected this – out of nowhere came a small, pretty French-speaking woman. She was colorful and so pretty and after just walking through the door in our home, all of us girls just couldn’t pull ourselves from her. A feeling came over me. Mom waited and waited and delivered her as she told me she would years ago. My father was delighted to see this and could never imagine us giving so freely to another. She was the answer to a lot that this family needed. She was so pretty, it was hard to believe - like mom.
Father left for Quebec. End part 1
Part 2- Upon his return, he noticed a change. Some of it he liked and some he would question. He paid her wage and they spoke for a while and she hugged and kissed us girls. I said to myself, “This isn’t happening. She is leaving us.” Father said her work was done here. We didn’t want her to go. He made his decision and she left, not wanting to. We felt it from her, she cried, and we watched her until she was out of sight. I was so angry for the first time with dad and none of us would speak to him at all. We wanted a mom and it was Cheree that we wanted. No one else would do. After a while, father agreed to find Cheree and maybe bring her back. She was gone as quick as she appeared! This struck father hard. Where did she come from? He started looking for her, for us and himself. Mom did deliver, dad sent her off. She was seen going south on the Ohio Canal. We followed her. Father got time off of work to look for her. She was easy to follow. All father had to do was describe her beautiful looks and we were going the right way. Father was falling in love and she was mom’s replacement and he knew it. His passion to find her opened him up and all the sorrow over mom was gone. We got to the Ohio River and it was busy down there at Portsmouth. She was boarding a river ship to return to New Orleans. We screamed for her. She heard us and came running to us. All of us held her tight. Then father took a step towards her and she asked him, “Are you lost?” He said, “How about coming home.” They kissed and we were jumping with joy, we were so happy! They were married soon after.
They lived out their lives here in the area. Cheree was great! I am 87-years-of-age. The oldest daughter, the story teller, was my mom. Let it live on.
I am her daughter making the heroine of this story my great-grandmother, and am sending it on to you. I am 80-years-of-age.
1528- On the discussion concerning the dam at the river near Mill St. that is the dam TKW has listed as the Trenton site giving the name Hilton to it. We took the time to see this ourselves today and the proof spans the river.
1528-This is not the TKW beat up web-page. We all have made plenty of goof-ups. Let’s look at his contributions which outweigh any mistaken identity issues. If I know him, he’ll stick to his beliefs anyhow.
Hey Jeff we attended the speech at Mensa and were very impressed with you. Sitting in the rear and being a little hard of hearing coupled with the lack of a microphone we hardly could hear you. Please go over the story of what sparked your interest in doing canal research.
1530-1525 Your take on certain events leads us to believe that you were there experiencing history at that given time. No one person (meaning you) has all the knowledge on any subject,,, no-matter how smart you think you are!!! Pat yourself on the back Canalwayman,, because no-one else is about too. You are no-less than a self appointed historian with few facts, my opinion leads to more of a jerk off!!!
1531 to 1530-That's a pretty heavy statement, all that jefk-off stuff. There’s no one left alive today that possesses all the answers and details about the Ohio and Erie Canal. But, for one to claim me to be this jerk-off and to list me as a self appointed historian must be an expert in the field. Hold on, that can't be so, because your own words say in posting 1530, that no one person knows everything, of course that excludes you, right. You must be an expert to make this determination of me. I wasn't there then (stupid) “to the one who posted in 1530” to experience real time, do you know why? because, I'm not old enough too have been. I do have a good imagination and I can also say that I, as others have often formulated opinions which probably run parallel in actuality to the real events of those days long ago. It doesn't take a scientist to figure out that it was hot in the summer or the bugs were biting, it still happens today you (idiot). There’s a long list of knowledgeable people who were working this canal before I had come along, I only contributed to their information by finding some sites which others hadn't found yet, one of which was Lower Webbsport Lock 19. There will always be disagreements and opinions will always vary when history is involved, I'd like to point this out; I didn't fall into the canal yesterday. I will go on record making the claim that another culvert, or be it an aqueduct, sits on the former Old Pennsylvania and Ohio Canal that hasn’t been discovered yet officially, and it sits in plain sight in Akron behind the train station at Arlington and Home Avenues. Opps, I guess I just officially made that claim to the world, just as I did by finding that lock on the Trenton Feeder, O that’s right, I did find and claim that didn’t I. I don’t sit at my computer and study these things, I go out and research for days on end. Today, I’m going back down to the area across from the Trenton Feeder doing discovery. I bought a cheap canoe to take me across safely. If I’m a jerk in your eyes, then so be it!! What accomplishment have you offered to the world?
May 9, 2010 11:02 AM
1532--As a member of several of our institutions dedicated to preserving the history and restoration of all of our canals here in Ohio I have something important to say about Mr.Maximovich. He does march to his own beat. That's not a bad thing to do; he has discovered places unknown to the rest of the canal research world here at home without any doubt. He is the only one with enough gumption to speak out and broadly disagree with the big names whose reputations are impeccable. For the most part, Maximovich is generally on his game. He is a man who will not hesitate to speak up and goes after the facts and obviously doesn't fear the establishments. Maximovich has carried out a vision and reawaked the canal and funded the entire expedition. Ask yourself why, the answer lies within his passion for the Ohio and Erie Canal. I pay attention to his work; he has defended his honor and in doing so by pointed out plenty of misgivings done by our best and well known names in the canal world we have today. He is no jerk, he probably sits with the best and most knowledgeable researcher to date.
T0 1531
Jeff-
Remember that discussion we had about A-hole bloggers on the site? Looks like you have a live one participating now. He/she makes "Troy" & "Multimember" look like geniuses. I'd suggest that this "genius/canal expert" use their spellchecker & do some actual research prior to sharing their opininions with the rest of us in the future.---W.A.Seed
1532
I read the "Troy" entries this morning (before they were bleeped off) Believe Dr Freud would have a field day diagnosing his brain. Possibly (1) Low self esteem (2)Extreme Homophobia- indicative of his own sexual self- doubts . The list could go on but that would be inappropriate for this forum;-------W.A.Seed
1533 I'll have Mr seed no that I'm intelectually gifted as well as a superior to others in the knowledge of the Ohio & Erie canal. My uncle walked sections and was fortunete enough to been part of it. I found things you f/n idiots don't no about yet. What's a medicine spoon you dorks, come on come now just answer. Where in the F is Chandlers Dry dock you illiterate self appointed dick bags.
Troy
1534 to 1533-Troy, do you really think you‘re asking such a difficult series of questions that cannot be dealt with? How’s this braniac? Chandlers Dry Dock was below lock 22 at Groveport, Ohio on the Ohio and Erie Canal at mile 213 do you want the GPS? “Excuse me, I’m yawning from boredom” A medicine bag and spoon was a reckless way of rubbing a mixture called medicine into leaks below the waterline in situations when the boat had to be fixed on the spot. Usually the mixture was manure and clay mix the spoon had a handle of a length capable of reaching far below and bent to match the boats contour which allowed you to apply pressure tightly to the body. The bag was pulled below the keel and up the other side to be effective. The bag was also buoyant which aided its purpose by applying pressure. To work it was rubbed up and down the hull until the leak ceased. Troy this is your very last request to behave.
1535
We visited the McKinley Museum and were quite impressed by your beautiful art work outlining the Ohio and Erie Canal. That's real impressive
1536-I find this Troy to be smug and tasteless by his actions. His remarks lead me to believe he suffers from several cronic illnesses. Troy, which device resembling a rifle was designed solely to connect a pulling team together.
1537-to 1535- My neighbor told me just the other day that they took their family to the museum and my work was there. I just found out yesterday that another display of mine will be at another museum and have a permanent home there. I was contacted recently by on of our better newspapers who would like to make some sort of documentation about the O & E Canal and its impact on early Ohio. I'm into that, we'll see. I done another documentation a couple of years back and after it was completed the individual fell short of cash and asked if I would cover the cost, I said no. After an exhausted battle with him to retrieve my work, I was finally able to make him sign a form stating that he wasn't allowed to use it without my consent.
1538- Which county that the Ohio & Erie Canal passed through had 3 guard locks?
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