Wedding of the Waters: The Erie Canal and the Making of a Great Nation [1825]

 The building of the Erie Canal, like the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge and the
Panama Canal, embodies one of the greatest and most riveting stories of American ingenuity

CBS This Mourning 200 years on the Erie Canal

Construction began on July 4, 1817, at Rome, New York. The first 15 miles (24 km), from Rome to Utica, opened in 1819.  

Construction on the Erie Canal financed by the state of New York + private investment finished in 1825.  

New York City, not New Orleans, becomes primary entry point for immigrants.

NYC becomes biggest, most prosperous city in the nation.

Western farmers ship EAST via the canal instead of SOUTH via the Mississippi/Ohio –Bonds the new northern states to old northern states

Northern cities live on food grown on northwestern farms, not southern plantations –No northern dependency on slave labor –Southern economy has to further rely on cotton, not diverse agricultural production

Floating Ideas: How the Erie Canal Helped Shape America (28:30_

'Wedding of the Waters': Building the Erie Canal (7:26)

Letter to President Jackson (1829)