Waterbury evening Democrat., 1907-04-12

an echo of the early years of the last century when Pennsylvanians were almost delirious with numerous projects for internal improvements. The commission, according to John Birkinbine, the engineer member of that body, does not advocate the es- tablishment of new canals, but sug- gests very plainly that the cheap sys- tenn of transportation offered by in land water routes might be revived were the legislature to enact laws which would cover the general subject and prevent these avenues of com merce from falling into "unfriendly hands"
 By "unfriendly hands is meant, of course, the railroads, which practically have rendered the artificial waterways of the state nearly obsolete, either by buying competing canals and allowing them to go to waste or by forcing them into docile acquiescence.
 It is interesting to recall that Penn sylvania was the pioneer among states which a century or more ago began to turn their attention toward canal building. At that time the To- comotive had not been invented. at least no practicable machine had been brought forward The only means of inland transportation for either pas sengers or freight was by means of wagons.
 So early as 1762 it was proposed to connect Lake Erie and the Ohio river with the Delaware by means of a canal. David Rittenhouse and Rev. William Smith surveyed route be. tween the Susquehanna and Schuyl- kill by way of the Swatara and Tul- pehocken. In 1791 company was formed to construct the canal, and the following year another company was incorporated to build canal from Norristown to the Delaware at Phil adelphia and to improve the naviga- tion of the Schuylkill. These com panies actually began work, and after they had spent $400.0O0. an enormous sum for those times, the construction was suspended for time. The two companies were united in 1911 as the Union Canal company, and after many embarrassment finally completed the work in 1927.
 Within a few years after the open ing of the nineteenth century the state was engrossed in canal projects. Canal routes were surveyed in almost every county.
 Following this impulse to the inter- nal improvement there was general quickening of public interest in the resources of the state. Because of new facility in transportation anthra- cite began to be used where wood had formerly been the only fuel. Iron mines and salt wells were opened. stimulated by the tariff. of 1928. and { the great bituminous coal fields in the western part of the state became an additional field for enterprise. The great internal improvements success fully executed in the decade between ] 1926 and 1886 were among the most ambitious undertakings ever accom- plished by any commonwealth in the new world. By October. 1884. the | Philadelphia & Columbia railroad was opened for travel. the main line of canal had been finished. and the com. pletion of the Allegheny Portage ! railroad made it possible for an emi- grant boat from the north branch of the Susquehanna to pass over the mountains, and proceed by way of the canal at Johnstown. on it's route to St. Lor.s.
 In 1886 the canals and railroads un- dertaken at the expense of the state and controlled by the legislature as public property had a mileage of ssek miles. and 134k miles of state canals were in course of construction Al the same time there were in op- eration 25sk miles of canals owned and operated by private corporations. But the area of railroad building was dawuing, and almost before the canal system had matured it was render ed obsolete by the speedier methods of transportation