A short account about the Feeder Canal

French Creek flows through Crawford County from north to south. It was the chief means
of shipping local lumber and New York State salt to the market in Pittsburgh. Thousands
of barrels of salt loaded on arks or keel boats passed through the county when the water
was at flood stage. The only other means of transportation in those days was by horses
and wagons. The answer to the crying need for better transportation seemed at hand in
1826. Major Douglass suggested forcing the waters of French Creek to raise the water
level of Conneaut Lake. The French Creek Feeder of the Beaver and Erie Canal would raise
the lake eleven feet to assure a sufficient depth to get canal boats over the summit and
north to Erie. The Conneaut Lake reservoir when full was 510 feet above Lake Erie and in
the forty miles between them there were 72 locks. The Beaver and Erie Canal crossed the
western part of Crawford County from north to south and was the first transportation
route constructed by man, other than turnpike toll roads, in the county.
The following August when word spread that the Feeder Canal would be built, the citizens
of Meadville planned a celebration for the breaking ground. On Monday, August 27, 1827,
the people assembled in Diamond Park and formed a procession. They marched down
Chestnut Street, up Water Street, then north on the French Creek Road (Terrace Street)
to a point opposite Tanner White‘s house. After a prayer by Reverend T. Alden and an
oration by Henry Baldwin, Jr., Robert Fitz Randolph and Cornelius Van Horne "broke
ground." Again the procession formed and proceeded to Lord's spring where they partook
of a cold collation and stove in a barrel of whiskey. The procession then returned to
Diamond Park where it disbanded in high spirits.

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