Norfolk day book. [volume] (Norfolk and Portsmouth Va.) 1868-1880, 1869-08-28
White Sulphur Springs, West Va, |
Saturday. August 81, 1869.

White sulphur Springs, west va,
Saturday, August 81, 1869.
This resort of fashion and infrmity,
of health and decrepitude, is sometimes
a rendezvous for the friends of public
enter prises broader and more towering
than the concerns of individuals.
The present week has been marked
by the presence OF company of gen.
tlemen who were deputed by the Ma
tional Board Of Trade which met at
Cincinnati last December to inquire
and report concerning the project of a
line of continuous water communica-
ton through Virginia between the
waters of the Ohio and James rivers.
This committee have been in session
here laboriously all the week until yes
terday, and made searching inquiry
into every branch of the subject in
trusted to their deliberations. They
have had the advice of several gentle
men of science, OF practical experience
and skill as engineers, in the course of
their sessions, and they have digested
the questions before them as thoroughly
as could be done by patient assiduity
under the circumstances surrounding
them.
They have agreed upon report
which, when signed by those members
of the committee who were not in at
tendance, will be submitted to the
National Board of Trade at its next an
nual session, which will be held next
December in Richmond Va. The cities
of the Union from which delegates
were appointed to this committee were
Portland, Boston, New York, Philadel-
phia, Baltimore, Norfolk, Richmond,
New Orleans, Memphis, st. Louis,
Louisville, Cincinnati, Chicago, Buffalo,
and St. Paul. The chairman of the
committee is Mr.. j. j. Porter, of Louis
vile, and one of the most energetic and
intelligent members is Mr.. Gano, of
Cincinnati-two cities which are most
vitality interested in the success of this
enterprise. .e.
The project Of connecting the waters
of the Kanawha and James rivers has
always been a darling one with the
Virginia people. 1t has become inter-
woven with the traditions Of the State,
and has commanded a popularity at all
times, and under all vicissitudes of the
history of either the work itself or Of
the people, which no public work ever
before enjoyed with any community.
The State has expended $12,000,00O
upon this line of navigation, and brought
the work up 200 miles from Richmond
to the town of Buchanan, at the western
base of the Blue Ridge. Construction
has been done on the line westward of
Buchanan, but has not been completed.
The distance between Buchanan and the
Greenbrier river (about seventy-6ve
miles, has yet to be filled up. Slack.
water navigation, from the mouth of the
entrance of the canal into Greenbriel
river to the mouth of the Great Kama
wha, will be for distance of 20S miles
i The whole distance of canal and slack
water navigation, from Underwater a
Richmond to the mouth of the Grea
Kanawha, will be 482 miles The dis
lance from Richmond to Norfolk is 12l
miles. The whole distance from st
Louis by this water route to Norfolk Ii
1868 miles. The time for navigation
between st. Louis and Norfolk will b.
eleven days.
The capital stock in the James Rive
and Kanawha Company is owned, a
TO- four-fifths by the State; the residu
being held by the cities of Richnaon
and Lynchburg, by Washington College
and by private individuals. If tn
! Commonwealth should be assured tina
the National Government would pre-