CHAPTER III

TRANSPORTATION FACILITIES CANALS AND RAILROADS

THE CANAL IN THE MAUMEE VALLEY.

In 1820 the Legislature of Ohio appointed three commissioners to locate a route for a navigable canal between Lake Erie and the Ohio River, and provided for its location through the Congress lands purchased of the Indians a few years before.

Little or nothing was done until 1824, when a survey and estimates were made for a canal from the Ohio River at Cinicinnati through the Maumee Valley to the Maumee River at Defiance, and thence along the northwest bank of the river to the head of the bay. One half or more of the survey was through an unbroken forest, from St. Marys to the Auglaize, for 40 miles there was not a house. In June, 1826, the survey of the Wabash division was begun, but little progress was made. Colonel Shriver, at the head of the surveying party from the beginning. In March, 1827, whole party. He was succeeded by Col. Asa Moore, his assistant, who continued the survey through 1826 and 1827 along the Wabash, and in 1827 and 1828 along the Maumee, until Colonel Moore also fell a victim to the disease, so prevalent, dying in his tent at the head of the Maumee rapids.

The survey was completed by Col. Howard Stansberry, who had been a member of the party from the beginning. In March, 1827, Congress granted to the State of Indiana a quantity of land equal to one-half of five sections in width on each side of the proposed canal. An act to aid the State of Ohio in extending the Miami Canal from Dayton to Lake Erie, and to grant a quantity of land to the State to aid in the construction, was passed May 24, 1828.

The work on the canal dragged along very slowly, from the middle of August until the middle of October. Men could not be had to face the dread disease, ague, and labor on the canals had virtually to cease during these months ; during the rainy season the Black Swamp, as all the Maumee Valley was termed, was impassable for teams to bring in supplies; and, to add to the difficulties, the contractors had frequently to stop for want of money to pay their hands, at times work having to be entirely suspended on account of the failure of the State to furnish money. In the annual report, dated January 2, 1843, the commissioners state that for the previous 15 months not a dollar in money had been paid to the contractors, and that there was then due about $500,000.

The Ohio division, known as the Miami and Erie Canal, was opened for business in June, 1845. Thus it will be seen that the Ohio canals were commenced in 1825 and completed in 1845, or a period longer than it is estimated that it will take to construct a sea level canal at Panama.

Yet none but an early settler can conceive what the difficulties were, that were contended

38 - HISTORY OF VAN WERT COUNTY

with. The greatest of these was chills and fevers. It was a brave man that could be induced to labor on the canal in the Black Swamp from July until November. Many gave up their lives to the dread enemy.

But with the opening up of the canal to commerce, a new impetus was given to the settlement of Northwestern Ohio. To the markets that sprang up along the canal, grain was hauled 20 and 30 miles, and lumber, staves and hoop-poles from to to 15 miles.

RAILROAD BUILDING.

But the human race is never satisfied. No sooner than the people of Northwestern Ohio had the canal, than they clamored for more rapid transportation. And so what was then known as the Ohio & Indiana Railroad was built from Crestline to Fort Wayne, Indiana. It was completed in 1853 to Lima; to Van Wert in 1854; and to Fort Wayne in 1855. This road afterward became the Pittsburg, Fort Wayne & Chicago. The Dayton & Michigan was built in 1858; the Lake Erie & Western in 1872; the Chicago & Erie in 1881; the Ohio Southern in 1894; the Lima Northern in 1897; and the Columbus & Lake Michigan in 1898. The Wabash was built to Fort Wayne in 1856; the Grand Rapids & Indiana in 187o; the Fort Wayne, Jackson & Saginaw (now the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern) in 187o; the Muncie (now the Lake Erie & Western) in 1872 ; the New York, Chicago & St. Louis (Nickel Plate) in 1882; and the Findlay, Fort Wayne & Western (now the Cincinnati, Hamilton & Dayton) in 1892. The Toledo, Delphos & Indianapolis, built in July, 1875; the Delphos & Kokomo, built in 1877; the Delphos, Bluffton & Frankfort. the Toledo, Cincinnati & St. Louis, the Dayton. Covington & Toledo, the Cincinnati Northern, the

Dayton & South-Eastern, the Toledo & Grand Rapids, and the Toledo & Maumee at some point were all merged in 1877 into what was known as the Toledo, Cincinnati & St. Louis system of over 700 miles of narrow gauge road, which have since been changed to standard gauge; although each was a small affair, they answered their purpose in their day, and helped to develop the country.

Such have been the rapid strides in railroad building in half a century, that one is hardly ever out of sight of the smoke of a locomotive, or the sound of a train of cars, and yet if the equipment of the roads were increased 33 per cent., they would not be able to handle the produce and merchandise promptly. The number of railroads built in the last half century but faintly explains the growth of transportation. In 1855 a carload of grain, lumber, or other articles was 18,000 lbs. and 14 cars on our level roads was a train load. Now a minimum carload is 40,000 lbs., and many of their new cars the railroads insist on being loaded to 100,000 lbs., and a train load is anywhere from 40 to 60 cars.

With the double tracks and the improved system of running their trains, the increase of capacity of the transportation lines is beyond computation and yet wholly inadequate.

In 1856 the rate of freight from Chicago to New York was 56 cents per too pounds, and railroad men said they did not believe it would ever be profitable at that. Now they are anxious to get it at one-fourth that rate.

What must have been the surprise of a delegation of Wyandot Indians, who visited their . former home, Upper Sandusky, a few years ago. And yet sight only reveals a tithe of the improvement.

To enter upon a description of the advance made in improvements in the fields of either agriculture or manufacture would be so far be-

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yond the comprehension of the writer that he will not attempt it. Let the fact that the vastimprovement in railroad facilities has fallen so far short of the needs of the community answer.

And yet the rounding out of another half century will not exhaust the capacity for improvement of the Black Swamp of North western Ohio.