Chapter I: Preface

This second monograph on the great American canals which played the part of important highways westward, is devoted to an outline of the Erie Canal. In the comparatively short space at our disposal for so great a theme, it has been possible only to sketch some of the leading features of our subject, namely, the early history of the Mohawk Valley route, the origin of the canal idea, its building, the celebration of its completion, a catalogue of its finances and enlargements, and its effect.

Our sources have been the state _Reports_, Sweet's _Documentary History_, Hawley's _Origin of the Erie Canal_, and the various state and local histories which treat of the subject. A monograph, in the form of a thesis, by Julius Winden, has been of great advantage, as will be indicated, in presenting the influence of the Erie Canal upon the population along its course.

The author is under a debt of gratitude to Hon. A. R. Spofford of the Congressional Library, Hon. John S. Billings of the New York Public Library, and T. M. Ripley of Marietta, Ohio, for advice and assistance.

A. B. H.

MARIETTA, OHIO, March 4, 1904.

The Great American Canals

Volume II

The Erie Canal