Chesapeake and Ohio Canal

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Map showing the course of the C&O Canal.

The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal , abbreviated as C & O Canal and the occasional Grand Old Ditch called, was a channel for inland waterways and from 1836 to 1924 in operation. It ran parallel to the Potomac River between Cumberland , Maryland and Washington, DC . The extension over the Appalachian watershed to the Ohio River was never realized. The total length of the canal is around 300 km. The difference in altitude of 185 m was overcome with the help of 74 canal locks . More than 150 culverts were built so that the canal could overcome relatively small watercourses . Eleven aqueducts were built to cross larger bodies of water, ten of which still exist. The canal also runs through the 950 m long Paw Paw Tunnel . The main purpose of the canal was to carry coal from the Allegheny Mountains to the Chesapeake Bay . It is now maintained as a National Historical Park , the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park . A hiking trail runs along the old towpath .

history

Early projects

After the American Revolutionary War , George Washington in particular advocated connecting the east coast of the United States with the Great Lakes and the Ohio River by water . Washington founded the Potowmack Company in 1785 to improve the navigability of the Potomac River. The Patowmack Company built a series of side canals to bypass the largest rapids and waterfalls, such as the Patowmack Canal in Virginia. Once completed, it was possible for boats and rafts to go downstream to Georgetown . The journey upstream was more difficult. Slender boats could be pulled against the current. With the completion of the Erie Canal , traders in the south became concerned that their businesses were threatened by the new canal in the north; as early as 1820, plans were made for a canal connection between Ohio and the Chesapeake Bay.

Construction of the canal

A cargo ship, roughly between 1900 and 1928.

The Patowmack Company property was ceded to the Chesapeake and Ohio Company in 1824. Benjamin Wright , the former chief engineer of the Erie Canal, was appointed chief engineer of the new canal project and construction began on June 4, 1828 with a laying of the foundation stone with the participation of then President John Quincy Adams .

The narrow strip of available land along the river between Point of Rocks in Maryland and Harpers Ferry in West Virginia sparked a violent legal battle in 1828 between the Chesapeake and Ohio Company (C&O) and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (B&O) for trying to pass the Exclude competitors from using it. After a lawsuit in Maryland involving Daniel Webster and Roger B. Taney , the two companies finally reached a compromise over sharing the right of way .

The canal was used from 1836 as a mail route for mail between Georgetown and Shepherdstown . Albert Humrickhouse received one thousand US dollars annually for the 72 tariff miles per day. The Potomac Aqueduct Bridge was opened near what is now Key Bridge in 1843 to connect the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal with the Alexandria Canal , which led to Alexandria , Virginia. During the 1870s, a boat lift in the form of an inclined lift with wet lift was built about three kilometers above Georgetown to enable the ships whose destination was below Washington to bypass the stowage in Georgetown. This elevator was removed after a severe flood when ownership of the canal was transferred to the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad in 1889. From then on, the railway company operated the canal in order not to lose the right of way to the Western Maryland Railway, especially in the area around Point of Rocks .

By the time the canal was built as far as Cumberland in 1850, it was already obsolete; the B&O rail line had already reached the city eight years earlier. Plagued by debt, the railroad company decided not to continue building the remaining 290 km to Ohio. The canal ceased operations in 1924 when another flood severely damaged the canal.

National park

C&O Canal in Georgetown, Washington, DC

The abandoned channel was assigned by B&O to the United States federal government in 1938 in exchange for a loan from the Reconstruction Finance Corporation . The government planned to restore the canal as a recreational area. The lower section with a length of around 35 km was repaired and flooded; the project was halted when the United States entered World War II and resources elsewhere were needed. After the war, Congress intended to convert the canal and towpath into a parkway . However, the idea of ​​dedicating the canal route to road traffic met with opposition, including William O. Douglas , an associate justice at the United States Supreme Court . In March 1954, Douglas led an eight day trek on the towpath of the Canal from Cumberland to Washington, DC. A total of 58 people took part in at least one part of the hike, Douglas and eight others hiked the entire 295 km long canal stretch. Public reaction and press coverage now turned against the idea of ​​converting it to a country road, and on January 8, 1971, the canal was designated a National Historical Park .

At present the park has an area of ​​around 80 km² and is frequented by more than three million visitors every year. The historic canal constructions are still endangered by floods and must be maintained. The National Park Service has re-flooded parts of the canal, but most of it is dry.

In Georgetown in particular, the park is a popular destination for the city's residents and is used by cyclists and joggers. Fishing and boating are popular in the flooded sections of the canal, and some whitewater kayakers use the canal to access the rapids upstream of the Potomac River. With the exception of the winter months, the National Park Service operates two canal boats, Georgetown and The Charles F. Mercer , which are pulled by mules .

After a particularly strong flood season in 1996 , part of the towpath on the canal known as Big Slackwater was no longer accessible and had to be bypassed extensively. It was restored between 2010 and 2012 so that since October 2012 the full length of the canal has been accessible again directly on the water. The work was funded by the State of Maryland and the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act .

Locks and other hydraulic structures

South portal of the Channel Tunnel at Paw Paw, West Virginia
North portal of the Channel Tunnel at Paw Paw, West Virginia

During the construction of the canal, the C&O Canal Company had a total of 74 locks built to overcome the difference in height between sea ​​level in Georgetown and the 186 m high Cumberland. Eleven stone aqueducts were built to guide the canal across the tributaries of the Potomac River. Seven dams were required to ensure the water supply to the canal. There are also a large number of weirs, and 200 culverts direct small watercourses under the canal. Other buildings on the canal include lock keepers' houses, bridges and security gates .

One of the most impressive structures on the canal is the 951 m long Paw Paw Tunnel , which was built to avoid an approximately ten kilometer detour. More than six million bricks were used in its construction . The construction of the tunnel took almost twelve years. Since it is narrower than the canal, it could only be navigated in one direction at a time.

Distinctive points in the course

See also

swell

literature

  • Joel Achenbach: The Grand Idea. George Washington's Potomac and the Race to the West. Simon and Schuster, New York NY et al. 2004, ISBN 0-684-84857-0 .
  • John Blackford: Ferry Hill Plantation journal. Life on the Potomac River and the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, January 4, 1838-1815 January 1839. Edited by Fletcher M. Green and Thomas F. Hahn and Nathalie W. Hahn. 2nd edition. American Canal and Transportation Center, Shepherdstown, Shepherdstown WV 1975.
  • Ella E. Clark, Thomas F. Hahn (Eds.): Life on the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal, 1859. American Canal and Transportation Center, York PA 1975.
  • Robert Cotton: The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal through the Lens of Sir Robert Cotton. = The C&O Canal in Photographs. Windswept House, Mt.Desert ME 1986, ISBN 0-932433-17-0 .
  • Morris Fradin: Hey-ey-ey, lock! 1st US edition. See-and-Know Press, Cabin John MD 1974.
  • Frederick Gutheim: The Potomac. Rinehart and Co., New York NY et al. 1949.
  • Thomas Swiftwater Hahn: The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal Lock-Houses and Lock-Keepers (= West Virginia University. Institute for the History of Technology & Industrial Archeology. Monograph Series. Vol. 3). Institute for the History of Technology and Industrial Archeology, Morgantown, WV 1996, ISBN 1-885907-03-6 .
  • Thomas F. Hahn: Towpath Guide to the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal. Georgetown Tidelock to Cumberland. 4th edition. American Canal and Transportation Center, Shepherdstown WV 1985, ISBN 0-933788-64-9 .
  • Mike High: The C&O Canal Companion. Updated edition. Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore MD 2000, ISBN 0-8018-6602-2 .
  • Robert J. Kapsch, Elizabeth Perry Kapsch: Monocacy Aqueduct on the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal. Medley Press, Poolesville MD 2005.
  • Robert J. Kapsch: The Potomac Canal. George Washington and the Waterway West. West Virginia University Press, Morgantown WV 2007, ISBN 978-1-933202-18-1 .
  • Elizabeth Kytle: Home on the Canal. Seven Locks Press, Cabin John MD 1983, ISBN 0-932020-13-5 .
  • Edwin M. Martin: A Beginner's Guide to Wildflowers of the C & O Towpath. Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington DC 1984, ISBN 0-87474-657-4 .
  • Kate Mulligan: Canal Parks, Museums and Characters of the Mid-Atlantic. Wakefield Press, Washington DC 1999, ISBN 0-9655552-1-6 .
  • Kate Mulligan: Towns along the Towpath. Wakefield Press, Washington DC 1997, ISBN 0-9655552-0-8 .
  • National Park Service - Division of Publications: Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. A Guide to Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park, Maryland, District of Columbia, and West Virginia (= United States. National Park Service. Handbook. 142). National Park Service - Division of Publications, Washington DC 1991, ISBN 0-912627-43-3
  • James Rada Jr .: Canawlers. Legacy Press, Cumberland MD 2001, ISBN 0-9714599-0-8 .
  • Ronald E. Shaw: Canals for a Nation. The Canal Era in the United States 1790-1869 , The University Press of Kentucky, Lexington KY 1993, ISBN 0-8131-0815-2 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Hahn , 1.
  2. ^ A b c d e John A. Lynch: Justice Douglas, the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal, and Maryland Legal History . In: University of Baltimore Law Forum . 35, Spring 2005, pp. 104-125.
  3. ^ Mackintosh , 1.
  4. a b c d Hahn , 7.
  5. National Park Service: Chesapeake & Ohio Canal NHP - Big Slackwater , October 13, 2012.
  6. National Park Service , The Paw Paw Tunnel is 3,118 feet long and is lined with over six million bricks. The 3/4 mile long tunnel saved the canal builders almost six miles of construction along the Paw Paw bends of the Potomac River. It took twelve years to build and was only wide enough for single lane traffic.