Two hundreds years ago, construction began on a 363-mile canal linking the Great Lakes to the Hudson River and New York City - an engineering and commercial triumph as revolutionary as the Internet. But the Erie Canal was dismissed at first. New York politician DeWitt Clinton spent 10 years fighting to sell the project to a deeply skeptical public, and Presidents Jefferson and Madison refused to help fund it. Yet the canal quickly changed the geography and commerce of the young nation. Richard Schlesinger reports on the history of the Erie Canal, still celebrated in song as an example of American ingenuity.
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Great engineering achievement. Thanks for sharing.
The Clinton of the 19th Century, concerned about commerce and peoples well being. The Clinton of the 20th Century, concerned about getting his rocks off in the mouth of young women. What a difference. And now I can see what a miracle it was for America to have evolved and developed into such a Great Country.
Went down the canal in a houseboat with my family in the 60's from Buffalo to the Finger Lakes. Should have seen my Dad swear when we hit the wall at one of the locks.
Wish the canal was used more, it would take some heavy lifting and alleviate the roads; but would move too slowly now for this century. But an enviable piece of construction under budget.
Democrats are screaming for Canal Control and take Canals away
You can cruise the Erie Canal with Blount Small Ship Adventures. They do 14 trips from NY to Canada and 16 day trips from New York to Chicago. www.blountadventure.com
I was born in Little Falls, the Highest Lift lock, Lock 17, on the Canal. Later grew up in Rochester, and lived also in Albion & Brockport all along the canal. Nice historical piece.
Great story. Grew up in Seneca Falls. Spent many a day down by the locks as a kid watching with amazement as the water filled and the boats passed thru. My mom worked on the Women's Hall of Fame in what is now a National Park in Seneca Falls honoring all women's achievements as well as the suffrage movement. Worth a visit if you are traveling in Upstate NY.
Are there narrow boats like in the UK that have been modified into houseboats?
John Royal you are a racist idiot
Typical CBS...race and gender BS in every story. I grew up by Lock 7 and never saw these people.
We should improve and expand the USA inland waterways and create new connections. For example, a new canal could be built to connect Lake Superior to the Mississippi River via the Saint Croix River. Reconstructing and expanding the old Ohio and Erie Canal could connect Lake Erie to the Ohio River to allow more traffic than it ever had in the past. Height limits from bridges could be raised or eliminated along all the waterways by adding lift bridges to allow taller ships to navigate more areas. Canals could be widened and deepened. Locks could be upgraded for faster and easier travel. Navigation and access improvements could improve travel times and reduce costs to make transport along the waterways more attractive again.
Oh, to be a government employee making truckloads of money for doing nothing.
A nice summary of history and the importance of the Erie Canal. Far Better than what I was taught in school. One last note, Seneca Falls was the model for Bedford Falls in It's a Wonderful Life.
Help me somebody! The pictures all seem to show the animals pulling the barge from one side of the canal. But wouldn't that pull the barge against the bank as well as down the canal? I have this mental picture of those poor animals dragging the barge against the bank for the whole trip.
Dennis - They had couple of employees on the boat. There was always someone to steer. The problems that did occur was when two boats approached from each direction. Certain rules applied and there was a specific method to get the two boats around each other.
I grew up in MN was fascinated with the song. After 40 years in CT I finally drove up to see the canal July 3rd. Never saw a hint that the 4th 2as it's 200th Birthday! Had a wonderful tour. This video adds much more! THANKS!
So if they blow up the locks, lake Erie will drain into NY.... hahaha
CBS didn't get the latest Mormon Memo....... They are NOW from Susquehanna, Pa. They even built a brand new little frontier house and everything just to prove it.
That's today's NEW history.
Do you want to know why it was ahead of schedule and under-budget? Because the government had nothing to do with it.
I live in the Binghamton NY area. The canal system use to run from Utica to Binghamton . Today nothing exists of from the canal system here other that the street that was filled in and called Water St. In a neighboring town there is a stretch of canal about a mile long that was abandoned when the rail road went through. It's on private property and faces being filled in and having corporate America built on it.Between Binghamton and Utica mostly all you see is historic markers designating that the canal once ran through there. In a town 30 miles away there is a small section of the canal visible but other than a sign saying what it is, it's just a grassy 100 yards long dirt pile
In a side note Clinton planned another canal from Lake Erie to the Ohio River at Cincinnati he went so far as to acquire land on Lake Erie and have his partner a surveyor named Ezekiel Haines lay out a town but with the coming of the railroad it now being impractical and no investors could be found.The town that eventually had people settle there was named Port Clinton,Ohio either in his honor or because he was a politician by himself for his vanity.
My family came over from Ireland to dig this canal.
With respect to Mayor Warren, Rochester was already a boomtown before the canal ran through it. Our foundation, and reason for growth and success, was and continues to be the Genesee River.
My wife and I went to Lockport last year and took the boot up the canal. Nice town and a cool boat ride. The owner of the B&B we stopped at on the trip joked there was one dead Irishman for every mile of the canal.
dklyde - I don't know about 1 for every mile but they did have problems with workers getting malaria. Treatment was not very effective back then so some workers did die.
So the Erie Canal was the above-ground part of the Underground Railroad. Got it.
I said to myself when i seen that this video was made by "CBS" Don't Watch. You know this is just going to be another dis on "Americana" or "Erie Canal Lore". Sure enough 45 seconds in, Leftists start banging on the song "It's not real" <smirk smirk> "Nobody sang the song" <smirk smirk> Lord Help Us!
You have a problem with facts???
And look at the price we have to pay for the loan from you know who!!!
This was not a good report. This reporter needs to go back to college and actually learn his trade.
I know about the canal, but have never heard that terrible "song".
We sang that song in elementary school
It's far from the most authentic canal song Robert, if we're talking about folk songs that were in use in the 19th century on the canal, but it's certainly the most well known Erie Canal song today. More here, if you're interested: http://daveruch.com/erie-canal-song/
One summer we rented a Canal Boat and went up and down the Erie Canal. Never piloted a boat before in my life. But after a 30 minute introduction we were off!
Do you have a family member named Robert? Went to Fairport?
yeah, it's amazing how far you can go on the canal system - they have four offshoots one goes down to the two large Finger Lakes, Cayuga and Seneca. People I know who live on the canal in Pittsford said the big boats pass by in the fall to take their boats to the Finger Lakes for the winter storage , in the summer the boats anchor on the lakes and swim and recreate- they have many marinas - the other offshoot is at Albany north to Lake Champlain up the St Lawrence Seaway and to Montreal. You can boat for miles on the canal system today.
American ingenuity? Great Britain has had canals and locks for many, many centuries. How about using that ingenuity in American education.
tootz1950 I stand corrected
Matt The total miles of English canals is much longer and goes just about everywhere. Hence all the narrowboats that people travel and live on in England. Can't do that in the US...the canals here don't connect unless it's with a river and most of those are not for the narrowboat life. Watch some of the narrowboat videos on YouTube. The canal maps are incredible.
The US is much much larger than England and its canals much longer
2:50 - "Completed in just eight years."
California has had a fully staffed "Department of High-Speed Rail" since 1995 and not one foot of track has been laid.
People are retiring from the department, with full pensions, never producing one thing the Department was set up to do.
Remember this when you look forward to socialized medicine or anything the government says it will provide for you.
There are many government programs that are run very well. Police, fire, military Sanitation Medicare Medicaid list goes on and on...I have never heard of anyone say we should have a private corporation for profit Military.
Laceykat66 it was easier to get land back then
The high speed rail project is a lot more complicated and has thus far yielded one new bridge. Our wonderful healthcare system in the U.S. allows for 45,000 deaths per year.
It produced cushy government jobs and probably got a career boost for the person who started it. So it produced exactly everything it was set up to do.
Reminds me of the " Canal du Midi" in France, same sort of engineering marvel and achievement. They had big dreams and visions back then.
On a clear nite you can see Ur"ANUS"
EJ Jaquez Then there are the people trying to colonize Uranus.
there are always people with "vision". more recent examples are the interstate highway system, the electric grid, the cellular network, the internet.
even right now there are groups out there trying to implement things like the hyperloop and space tourism and colonizing mars (a dumb idea, but one requiring vision).
and all of those are just examples of vision from within the same sort of infrastructure space that spawned the canal.
Happy Birthday Erie Canal
the old canal splits my grandparents property in half in Canal Fulton OH.
gascanEXPLODE This is in New York. It is nowhere near Ohio.
There is the old Erie canal and there is the canal of today. some of canal today does not run on the old canal
in Chittenango is some of canal. Runs towards Syracuse
some of the old canal does run along the barge canal.
I thought it was now called the Barge canal
I knew the second I saw the black lady she would somehow find a way to bring race into this.
tomthefunky you are a racist idiot
tomtheflunky - If she brought up this historical fact for no other reason than to get under your skin, then that's a good thing.
She is well-versed in the Erie Canal's history, that's all.
I'm sorry you are triggered by U.S. History.
Great story of an American canal that posed as a great American river.
I'm curious why you wouldn't link it to our country, despite the fact that it was funded by a Governor? Granted, it wasn't a nation-building project but at the same time it contributed greatly to our nation ...
Steven Stoffers Well, good for you!
it was paid for by New York issued bonds. the American stuff is happy crappy nonsense. I like to think of it as a monument to the human spirit.... not having anything to do with the damn USA.
was great living near the Eriecanal Born and raised in Medina by the canal. Grandpa worked on the lift bridge
Where'd they put all the dirt ? ?
Paul Betka none ya damn business...
Where it was needed.
They dug a hole and buried it.
Several years ago, while spending a few days at Niagara Falls, we took a side trip to Lockport and toured a portion of the canal. For me it was an eye-opener. I'd known about the canal since grammar school, but the engineering achievement of canal and its impact on our nation had, until that moment, been lost on me.
I know that song from Rugrats. 😂
My boyfriend worked 20 years as lock master for the Champlain Locks.
I grew up in Lockport and know the locks well. When my grandfather was young he ran away one summer and was a mule runner on the canal
Definitely 20th century. "After an idle year in 1916, the boats made a last mule-drawn trip to Albany with lumber. But ice caught them on the way back, and they were left to winter at Frankfort, near Utica."
Quoted from the following source: http://buffalonews.com/1990/06/03/canal-boatman-remembers-the-long-haul-from-albany-to-buffalo-childhood-on-old-erie-was-an-adventure/
It seems like the the horse ... mule ... power survived well past the first American Industrial Revolution and just past the start of the first World War.
Any idea what decade that would have been? I didn't think mules were used after the 19th century.