Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1914-07-29
and barges amount to approximately g.

Around the cape of late years have gone
at least $1,000 craft OF various sorts in the
course OF each twelve months. OF this
volume 20 per cent. represents steamers
and barges under tow. The total regis
tered tonnage OF all craft, including sail
ing vessels, reaches 25,000,000.
Six steamship lines have made regular
trips by the outside course and fifteen
companies are engaged in the coal trade
between New England ports and New
York, Philadelphia and southern points.
OF late the coal trade has gradually left
the schooners and gone into steamers, and
it is expected that much of this traffic
will take the new route for the reason
that it offers possibilities of shorter trips
and lessening OF marine losses.
The project OF the Cape Cod canal has
appealed to naval officers as presenting
possibilities OF great strategic Importance
to the protection OF the North Atlantic
coast in time OF war. Several writers in
the service have urged that the govern
ment acquire the canal and deepen 1t to
the extent necessary to float the Atlantic
squadron through it. Rear Admiral Colby
M. Chester, in an article entitled "The
Naval Importance OF the Cape Cod Canal",
says that the deepening of the Cape Cod
canal sufficiently to permit the passage of
battleships would obviate the deplorab BILE
necessity OF sending feet around Nan
tucket South shoal, add greatly to the
zone Of control OF the fleet, and increase
the value Of the harbor defences Of Boston
and New England ports as we'll.
But while the military advantages are
an asset of the canal company, the latter's
officers say that no sale of the property to
the government is desired, the purpose
being to push its commercial profit for the
benefit OF shareholders.
The canal was built by the Cape Cod
Construction Co., Of which August Bel
mont is president. The vice-presidents
are Commodore j. w. Millet, OF New
York, and A. Lithgow Devens, OF Boston.
William Barclay Parsons is chief engineer,
and Charles r. Warning resident engineer.
No president has been chosen for the
operating company, the Boston, Cape Cod
d New York Canal Co. Mr.. Belmont, F.
De c. Sullivan, of New York, and Charles
II. Slattery, OF Boston, are the vice presi-
dents. The secretary is U. A. Murdoch,
OF Babylon, l.. l., and the treasurer John
J. Coakley, Of New York.
The canal itself is without locks and is
greater in it's dimensions than the original
Suez canal or the famous English Man
chester canal. On the Cape Cod side is a
huge breakwater 5000 feet in length con-
tanning $4,000 tons of granite. The only
curve in the channel has radius of 7,640
feet, SO that the route is practically
straight
At the start it will be open only to ves-
sells drawing not more than fifteen feet Of
water. Later it will be dredged deeper,
and eventually will have a depth of
twenty five feet at low water, which will
enable the canal to handle practically all
craft now engaged in coastwise traffic.
The canal project which has now be-
come an actuality has long been a pet
scheme in Massachusetts,. 1t has been
recognized necessity, and time after time
efforts have been made to devise means of
getting the project definitely under way.
Under the date Oct. 6, 1876, Samuel Sew
ell records in his diary: "Mr. Smith,
of Sandwich, rode with me and showed
me the place which some had thought to
| cut for to make passage from the south
sea to the north"
Things moved slowly, however, and it
was not until 1879 that commission was
appointed by the general court to ''view
the place and make report on the prob
ability of effecting such channel and
what the charge of the same may be-.
There is no record of what conclusions the
commission reached.
In May, 1776, another commission was
named, and Thomas Machin, the most
eminent engineer of his day, was en-
ployed to make survey. He recon-
mended practically the same route which
has now been adopted. The Revolution,
nothing came OF the scheme.
Commissions made additional surveys
in 1871, 1918, 1924 and 1881. After that the
project seems to have been forgotten until
1860, when Congress appointed a commits
sion, and the canal might then have been
built by the federal government if the
civil war had not interviewed.
In 1884 the state granted a charter under
which work was begun for the first time,
but as usual the project was abandoned
and the charter lapsed.
The charter under which the canal was
built at last was granted in 1899 to De
Witt Clinton Flanagan and amended in
1900 August Belmont and a number of
his friends became interested in the
scheme in 1904 and after thorough in
vestigation, took steps towards financing
the proposition in 1906.
June q, 1909, Mr.. Belmont and party
of noted financiers went to Bournedale,
and there, with silver shovel, Mr.. Bel
mont turned the first spadeful of earth
which marked the official beginning of
the great engineering feat which has now