Spring at the Combines
by Kendall McKernon
Title
Spring at the Combines
Artist
Kendall McKernon
Medium
Photograph
Description
The state legislature appointed New York Mayor DeWitt Clinton to study possible routes for the Erie Canal and Champlain Canal. On Feb. 21, 1816, the legislature approved the first publicly funded canal to be built in the United States.
Two years later, excavation began on the Champlain Canal near Fort Edward. This crude canal was built with picks, shovels, wheelbarrows and the labor of many men.
By 1820, a feeder route was explored, with a dam across the Hudson River at Fort Edward. While the $92,000 dam was a success, there was still not enough water. A proposal followed for a new feeder from Sandy Hill (Hudson Falls).
Glens Falls businessmen lobbied to have the headwaters of the new feeder extended to Glens Falls. Because of the poor roads, merchants needed a cheap and direct form of transportation to get goods to market.
The Feeder Canal was developed over nine years - seven miles of narrow waterway, permitting one boat at a time, with 13 wooden locks over a 130-foot height difference. It flowed into the Champlain Canal two miles above Fort Edward.
Among the locks were the Five Combines, first built of wood with no sluicing. Later, stone from Kingsbury replaced the early work, and each combine lifted a boat 11 feet for a total of 55 feet over a distance of 500 feet.
In 1832, the Glens Falls Feeder opened, permitting boats to go to the sawmills and lime kilns.
Within three years, the Glens Falls Company, at the bottom of Glen Street hill, was manufacturing lumber, lime and black marble to be shipped on the Feeder Canal. Some of that black marble was used in the construction of the Washington Monument.
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March 6th, 2018
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