The story of the Eric Canal is the story of industrial and economic progress between the War of 1812 and the Civil War. The Artificial River reveals the human dimension of the story of the Erie Canal. Carol Sheriff's extensive, innovative archival research shows the varied responses of ordinary people-farmers, businessmen, government officials, tourists, workers-to this major environmental, social, and cultural transformation in the early life of the Republic. Winner of Best Manuscript Award from the New York State Historical Association “ The Artificial River is deeply researched, its arguments are both subtle and clear, and it is written with grace and an engagingly light touch. The book merits a wide readership.” ― Paul Johnson, The Journal of American History The United States was a new republic in 1817. The generation of its original revolutionaries was fast dying; a second war with Great Britain had recently been settled; and expansionism was the mood of the day. The "children of the founders," as Carol Sheriff calls this first 19th-century American generation, sought to make its mark with engineering projects that would further national growth and prove to Europe that the new nation "played a leading role in God's plan to improve the earthly world." It did so in grand style with the Erie Canal, a huge waterway that linked Atlantic seaports with the Great Lakes. Sheriff's vigorous account of the canal's conception and building makes for an epic story and fascinating reading. “ The Artificial River is deeply researched, its arguments are both subtle and clear, and it is written with grace and an engagingly light touch. The book merits a wide readership.” ― Paul Johnson, The Journal of American History “A beautifully written and unpretentious book that reveals how little historians have known about something they have written so much about: the Ere Canal.” ― Richard White, University of Washington “[Sheriff] renders the Erie Canal's history from a fresh point of view . . . the everyday lives of ordinary people who lived along the waterway.” ― Paul Grondahl, Albany Times Union “Broadly conceived, imaginatively researched, incisively argued, and gracefully written.” ― Robert H. Wiebe, Northwestern University “An excellent study of an important, all too often neglected period.” ― Lee Milazzo, The Dallas Morning News The story of the Erie Canal is the story of industrial and economic progress between the War of 1812 and the Civil War. Carol Sheriff uses innovative archival research to document the varied responses of ordinary people to this major environmental, social, and cultural transformation in the early life of our Republic. Carol Sheriff , a native of Bethesda, Maryland, received her B.A. from Wesleyan University and her Ph.D. from Yale University. She is assistant professor of history at the College of William and Mary. She lives in Williamsburg, Virginia. The Artificial River The Erie Canal and the Paradox of Progress, 1817-1862 By Carol Sheriff Hill and Wang Copyright © 1997 Carol Sheriff All right reserved. ISBN: 9780809016051 The Artificial River 1 Visions of Progress O N JULY 4, 1817, at daybreak, cannons boomed as a crowd assembled near Rome, New York, to watch the digging of the first spadeful of Erie Canal dirt. The honor fell to Judge John Richardson, who had been awarded the first contract to build a section of the waterway. Richardson addressed the gathering, proclaiming, "By this great highway unborn millions will easily transport their surplus productions to the shores of the Atlantic, procure their supplies, and hold a useful and profitable intercourse with all the marine nations of the world." He then drove his spade into the ground, and--according to the Utica Gazette --"was followed by the citizens, and his own laborers, each vieing with the other in this demonstration of joy of which all partook on that interesting occasion."a Amid an enthusiastic and popular celebration of the nation's Revolutionary heritage, the state of New York had begun construction on what was to be one of the longest artificial waterways in the world.1Events leading up to that sunrise ceremony began hundreds of millions of years earlier, with a series of continental collisions giving rise to the Adirondack and Appalachian mountains. Byproducing intimidating obstacles to human migration, those natural barriers--together covering an area between what are today southern Canada and northern Alabama--checked the westward expansion of the vast majority of Euro-American settlers in the original colonies, and in the newly formed states, of North America. Those who did venture beyond the Atlantic basin took advantage of several gaps left by the prehistoric collisions. In the northern colonies, the only such break was the one through which the Mohawk River flowed easterly from central New York to the Hudson River, which in turn ran southward into the Atlantic Ocean. While Dutch and