History of York County Pennsylvania, Volume I, Part 109

Author: Prowell, George R.
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: J. H. Beers
Number of Pages: 1372

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Canal

The significance of this improve- ment was shown from the im-

The canal was now completed and

The opened for free navigation. A Ger- First man by the name of Kreider, from

Ark. the Juniata valley, soon appeared with a boat heavily freighted with flour, which he safely landed three days later at the city of Baltimore. His success became known, and the following year many

Opened. portance attached to celebrating its completion. This occurred on the 22nd of November, 1797. Thomas Mif- others did the same and were well paid for

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TURNPIKES, CANALS, RAILROADS

their efforts. Boats landed at Columbia, and the large quantity that was then floated and the merchandise from there conveyed to Philadelphia. Experienced pilots soon afterward succeeded in guiding large "arks " safely through the falls of the river. By the charter incorporating the canal com- pany it was to afford free navigation, and just how the canal company was to be re- munerated does not seem clear, especially if the arks were successful in passing the falls, and disposing of the produce transported on them to any desired market. Thousands of dollars were at first lost by the company. and they applied to the legislature for relief. Eventually some state relief was received, and a small amount of toll charged for each boat that passed through the canal. From 1797 to 1814, the affairs were managed by the canal company, and proved quite a suc- cess.

An attempt was made by James Hopkins, during this period, to build a canal around the falls on the opposite side of the river, in which venture he lost a large fortune. It was intended as an opposition canal to the one on the York County side, but proved to be a disastrous failure. A flouring mill and other buildings were erected in the imme- diate vicinity of the canal on the York County side, by the company that controlled it. This property, in 1797, was valued at 1,280 pounds currency, which valuation in- cluded 150 acres of land.

On November 20, 1810, Thomas The Willing Francis, of Philadelphia, Baltimore who then managed the affairs of Company. the company, whose interests consisted of a large merchant

down the Susquehanna in flat boats, and manufacturing it into flour in the large merchant mill already erected, and others which the company designed to build. This new company was formed with a capital of $100,000, and divided into twenty- five shares of $4,000. Thomas WV. Francis, who disposed of the property for the Phila- delphia company, retained an interest in the new enterprise to the amount of four shares, $16,000. Joseph Townsend became man- ager for the Baltimore company; Joseph Weatherburn and John Wilson, trustees. The land purchased at this time was a tract of 151 acres, a tract of 6458 acres called "Hopewell," and another tract of 12 acres, projecting into the river called "Cape Fran- cis." The first two tracts were conveyed to Thomas W. Francis, in 1801, by Charles Willing Hare, a lawyer of the city of Phila- delphia. The conveyance in 1810 granted to the new company all the "ways, woods, water-courses, water, mill-works, rights, liberties, privileges, hereditaments and ap- purtenances." The contract was signed, sealed and delivered in the presence of Elisha Powell and John Amy, before Wil- liam Tilghman, chief justice of the state of Pennsylvania.

The interest at once began to

Business loom up. Three new mills were

Boomed. built, one having a capacity of 150 barrels of flour a day ; at that time this mill had the largest capacity of any mill in the state. Cooper shops, hotels and private residences were soon built.

The Baltimore company succeeded with mill, nail factory, ferry and land, all assessed their enterprise at York Haven for a period at $40,000, transferred all right and title to of twenty years. When the railroad was built from Baltimore to York, in 1838, and extended to Harrisburg, in 1850, the glory of York Haven faded. A flourishing town has been built on the site in recent years, since the erection of the paper mills and the power plant at this place. John Weatherburn, Thomas Wilson and Joseph Townsend, of Baltimore, represent- ing a number of merchants of that city, who, on September 24, of the same year, formed a company for the purchase of this property. The members were William Cole, William Wilson and Sons, William Gwynn, Joseph THE STATE CANAL SYSTEM. Townsend, Hackman and Hoppe, Isaac Burnston, Thomas Hillen, John Weather- The Pennsylvania Railroad from Phila- delphia to Columbia, and canal to the junc- tion there, thence by the Juniata to Holli- daysburg and Portage road to Johnstown, west of the Allegheny Mountains, and canal burn, Dennis A. Smith, Jacob Stansbury, William McMechen, George Repold, James Nelson, John Davis and Joshua Stevenson. They were prominent citizens of Baltimore, and associated themselves together for the to Pittsburg, constituted what was, in 1831, purpose of purchasing wheat of this section, known as the "Main Line." From the junc-

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HISTORY OF YORK COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA

tion to Northumberland, thence by the of Middletown; James Hepburn, John C. North and West Branch to Wilkesbarre and Boyd, Northumberland County; Joseph Williamsport, was known as the North and Todhunter, William Bose, Samuel Jones, of West Branch Division of this system. These works were put under contract as

Baltimore: James Evans, Port Deposit, Md .; Roland Curtin, Center County; Wil- early as 1826 and 1827. The main line of liam McElvay, Columbia County; and George M. Hollenback, Luzerne County.

canal was finished to connect with the Union Canal at Middletown, in 1830, and to Columbia in 1831; the North and West Branch a year or two later. Trade over the line was commenced under the auspices of several transportation companies, conspic- uous among which were D. Leech and Com- pany's Transportation Line, Union Line, Dougherty's Section Boat Line, and in due time other lines, besides several packet boat lines running from Columbia in connection with the railroad to and from Philadelphia to Pittsburg, thus making the traveling and freight facilities over the main line, com- plete at that time, and during the subse- quent two years to Northumberland, along the North and West Branch of the Susque- hanna, to Wilkesbarre and Williamsport. the two remotest points on the Susque- hanna at that time. The packet lines were thus enabled to supplant the stage coach lines stopping at all the regular stations and eligible points for the accommodation of the traveling public. The lines were cast and a blast of the bugle horn set them off to the next station, and thus it went on to the close of navigation every fall.

Tide be too long, tedious and expensive,

Water and a plan was laid for a canal from

Canal. Columbia down the Susquehanna

At the first meeting of the stockholders after the incorporation, a board of directors was elected and James Hepburn, of North- umberland, was made the first president : F. Palmer, of Philadelphia, treasurer, and Edward F. Gay, chief engineer. The first survey was made on the east side of the Sus- quehanna, and on March 21, 1836, a supple- mentary act was passed authorizing the commissioners to change the location to the west side of the river, by means of a dam and tow-path bridge at Columbia. The work was then let, and the construction commenced immediately in the spring of 1836, and finished so far as to admit the water late in the fall of 1839.

. At the opening of the canal some of

Open the most distinguished persons of

for Pennsylvania and Maryland were

Use. present. It was on that occasion that Nicholas Biddle, of Philadel- phia, the great financier, made his famous speech on Internal Improvements, then a subject of paramount importance, in view of the development of the great material wealth of the states. The excursion down

This route was soon discovered to the canal from Wrightsville was a success, but the party composing it had scarcely reached home when disastrous breaks oc- curred along the greater part of the line. The most extensive breaks were at the Ot- ter Creek Aqueduct, and at York Furnace, in Lower Chanceford Township, owing to defects in the puddling of the wings form- ing the junction with the aqueduct. The

to the Chesapeake Bay in order that an outlet to a better grain market might be reached and for the development of the coal fields and lumber interests of the north and west branches, for which purpose a stock company was formed in 1824, with a bed and banks of the canal at this point paid up capital of $1,500,000. The Susque- were held in place by winged abutments, hanna and Tide Water Canal was chartered and retaining walls of huge blocks of gran- ite, thirty-five feet above the bed of the river. Even the heavy blocks of stone were washed away into the river. by the states of Pennsylvania and Maryland. April 15, 1835, with the following named persons as commissioners: Robert Mc- Curdy, James M. Sanderson, Edward Cole- Although this break was much the man, Simon Gratz, Charles S. Boker, Henry Cost largest of the series, it cost less to White. George H. Hickling, all of Philadel- of repair it than the aggregate cost of phia; Jeremiah Brown, James A. Caldwell, Canal. the numerous smaller breaks. It Lancaster County; Evan Green, of Colum- was unfortunate that these disas- ters should have occurred at a time when bia; Charles A. Barnitz, of York; Jacob M. Haldeman, of Harrisburg; Simon Cameron, there was no money in the treasury, no

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TURNPIKES, CANALS, RAILROADS

credit, and the company involved in debt. cargoes as high as 150 tons, instead of sixty Means were nevertheless availed by the di- tons, as in 1850. rectors upon their individual responsibility, This canal started at Columbia, where it united with the Pennsylvania Canal, crossed the Susquehanna to Wrightsville, and ex- tended from thence along the river to Havre de Grace, Maryland, at the head of the Chesapeake Bay. Its length was forty five miles, of which thirty miles were in York County and fifteen in Maryland. The lower portion north to the state line was the Tide Water Canal. As early as 1814, a route had been surveyed by Baltimore capi- talists, with the design of building a canal from the Susquehanna, near York, to tide- water, for the purpose of attracting the trade of the upper Susquehanna Valley to Baltimore. There was nothing accom- plished at that time, and the era of railroads had already begun in York County before this canal was constructed. On the entire Canal were forty-three locks, four dams, five culverts, eighteen bridges, thirty-three waste-ways and wiers, and six aqueducts. The surface width of the canal was fifty feet, and its depth five and a half to six feet. The locks were 170 feet long, and seventeen feet wide. and the work was repaired during the win- ter, and the canal opened to the public in the spring of 1840, at an entire cost of $4,000,000. Of this sum, the Columbia dam cost $220,000. The towing-path bridge, in- cluding the cost of right to attach the same to the superstructure of the Columbia Bank and Bridge Company's structure, cost $90,000; and the Havre de Grace lock, four miles long, and outlet lock, cost $500,000. The reason why the work cost more than the chief engineer's estimate was largely due to unforeseen contingencies, for the cost of which no provisions had been made, and once under process of construction, had to be surmounted at a cost however great. The sudden advance in labor, and the extra cost in material for the bed and banks of the canal, which had to be dug from the line of the Susquehanna and Tide Water fields on the tops of high hills, and dumped through expensive shute-ways to the rocky bed of the canal, and then conveyed in carts to such points which were largely deficient in material, were also a cause of great ex- pense. More than nine-tenths of the work was founded on the foot-rocks of the hill- side in the river, and numerous points of In January, 1872, the Reading bold, rocky bluffs were blasted away in Value Railroad Company leased the to canal and operated it until 1894. York The people of the lower end of County. York County gave it hearty en- couragement. Before its con- struction all the lime used in the lower end order to reduce the radius within the lines of free and easy navigation. Deep holes and chasms were filled and crossed upon sub-structures of huge oak timbers, ad- justed longitudinally several feet below the lowest stage of the river, upon which many of York County was hauled in wagons from of the high vertical retaining walls were founded.

Navigation. the trade was dull, and the revenue proportionately small owing to the instability of the canal, the want of boats, and a change in the develop- ment of the coal and timber interests in the north and west branches of the Susque- hanna. The trade, however, soon com- menced to increase rapidly for many years, until it reached its maximum in 1870, when it was largely divided and gradually dimin- ished, by reason of many railroad lines tap- ping the sources of a large trade created by the opening of the Susquehanna and Tide Water Canal. Meantime, the capacity of the work increased, boats descended with

During the season of 1840, the azoic slate soils, and either in the form

the valleys around York to the lower town- ships. Lime became extensively used in of the natural stone, or as quick lime, was transported down the canal from the Cono- jehela and Kreutz Creek Valleys. It had a magic effect on the land at first, and caused the crops of wheat, rye, corn and oats to produce more abundantly, soon changing the whole aspect of the lower end of York County. In this respect the canal was of more real value to the farmers of that region than to the men who owned it. The original canal company issued money in the form of "shin plasters" which fell below par at times. Eventually an extensive business was done and the canal became very useful. D. F. Shure was the superintendent of this

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HISTORY OF YORK COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA

canal from 1842 until 1894, when it ceased to be operated.

A disastrous flood of the Susquehanna in 1894 destroyed the locks and dams of the canal and caused many breaks all along its line. Owing to this destruction, the canal was never repaired. The Reading Railroad Company was released from its obligations with the company that owned the canal, which then ceased to be operated. All its interests were sold at public auction in the fall of 1894 in front of the Court House at York and purchased by a citizen from Bal- timore.

Boats were run over this canal by paying a toll. William McConkey was collector of tolls at Wrightsville from 1842 to 1872. From 1872 to 1894 Henry B. Paxton was the collector. For a period of thirty years William McConkey owned from three to five boats which ran over the Tide Water and other canals, transporting grain, coal, lumber and iron from the interior of Penn- sylvania to Baltimore, Philadelphia, New York and other points. These products were conveyed entirely by water through different canals by horses or mules and over larger bodies of water by means of tug- boats. On many occasions, one of Mc- Conkey's largest boats with a capacity of 140 tons, carried goods by water to Lake Champlain and brought back a fine quality of ore with ninety per cent of iron. This ore was obtained along Lake Champlain. Captain Frank Butcher, employed by Wil- liam McConkey, frequently made the trip from Wrightsville to the lake, and back again. Other prominent owners of boats at Wrightsville, which ran over the canal, were Kerr Brothers, Cook Brothers, Thomas Falvey, William B. Famous, Andrew Leddy, Jacob Manning, William Thomp- son, John Thompson, Franklin Butcher.

A charter was granted for the The York construction of a canal from Navigation. York along the Codorus Creek to the Susquehanna River, in 1825. The names of the commis- sioners mentioned in the charter were Jacob Spangler, George Small, Jonathan Jessop, John Barnitz, Clement Stillinger, John De- muth, George Loucks, Charles A. Morris, Daniel D. Dunn, Jacob Eichelberger, Mich- ael Doudel and John Meyer. The contract for the construction of the navigation was

given, in 1830, to George Wasson, Henry Charles, Solomon Ruthrauff and Christian Hildebrand, who agreed to build it for the sum of $47,350. In 1831 a number of stock- holders made an excursion down the canal as far as it had been completed. At a meet- ing held Charles A. Barnitz, president, described the advantages of the canal to the borough and county of York. In June, 1832, Gottlieb Ziegle, James Schall and Daniel Ford launched the "Pioneer," a boat forty feet long. In July of the same year James Chalfant launched his boat, the "Co- dorus," which was seventy feet long. This boat could carry 150 passengers. On July 4, 1832, an excursion passed down the canal a distance of three miles from York, where the day was celebrated on the banks of the creek.

In November, 1832, the navigation to the mouth of the Codorus was completed. On the 18th of November the first ark arrived from the Susquehanna with a load of about 40,000 feet of lumber and 100 or more peo- ple on board, who had gone out to witness the opening of the navigation. The second ark contained 70,000 shingles, which were consigned to Joseph Schall and Company. For a time a large business was carried on over the canal in the transportation of lum- ber, coal, grain and other products, but the construction of the York and Wrightsville railroad, and in 1849-50 the York and Cum- berland Railroad to Harrisburg, caused the value of the Codorus Navigation to dimin- ish, and it soon ceased to be operated.

THE FIRST IRON STEAMBOAT.

Public attention was called to the im- portance of removing obstructions and im- proving the navigation of the Susquehanna River as early as 1793. In March, 1823, the legislature of Pennsylvania passed an act for the improvement of the river, from Northumberland to tidewater. Commis- sioners were appointed to superintend the work. They made a report, January 14, 1828, stating that the improvement from tidewater to Columbia was then nearly com- pleted. "Crafts would be able to descend from Columbia to the head of Maryland Canal, bearing sixty tons burden, which heretofore could not bear half that amount. The section between Columbia and North- umberland was yet unfinished, and on both

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TURNPIKES, CANALS, RAILROADS

sections $15,124 had been spent in the im- favor." Early the next spring Captain El- provement of the river." This was paid by gar determined to navigate the Susque- a state appropriation. A number of enter- prising citizens of Baltimore, most of whom were identified with the Merchant Flouring Mills at York Haven, formed a company for the purpose of testing the practicability of running steamboats on the Susquehanna between the towns of York Haven and Northumberland. 'T'he stock was soon sub- scribed; some York merchants took an active interest in the project.

The company advertised for the manu- facture of steamboats. John Elgar, who was an intelligent and ingenious Quaker of York, was then a master mechanic in Webb, Davis and Gardner's foundry and machine shop. He constructed a sheet iron vessel in these shops. It was ready to be launched on the 8th of November, 1825.

The boat had sixty feet keel and nine feet beam, composed externally of sheet-iron, riveted with iron rivets. The weight of the boiler was two tons and the entire weight of the boat five tons. The form of the boiler was cylindrical. Anthracite coal was used to produce steam. The entire cost was $3,000. The boat was completed and loaded on an eight-wheeled wagon, to which ropes were attached, and on November 14, 1825, it was drawn from the foundry west of the Codorus Creek to the east end of Market Street, amid the shouts and huzzas of a multitude of people. The boat was named "Codorus," in honor of the stream along whose waters it was brought into ex- istence. It was launched on the Susque- There were two other vessels made for this Baltimore company: the "Susque- hanna, and soon after "in majestic style" sailed up the stream to Harrisburg, with a hanna," which exploded at Berwick, eighty party of 100 people on board. Thousands miles above Harrisburg, while attempting of people gathered at the shore to witness to ascend the river; and the "Pioneer," the novel spectacle. The star spangled ban- which was too heavy.

ner, on the flag-staff at the prow of the ves- sel, was waving in the breeze and Captain John Elgar commanded the boat. On their arrival at Harrisburg the entire party was escorted to Buehler's Hotel, where a ban- quet was prepared for them.

The boat then made a number of trips between York Haven and Harrisburg. The members of the legislature, on December 5, 1825, expressed their "great satisfaction with the success of the experiment of the Codorus, and its enterprising proprietors should receive legislative enactment in their

hanna as far up stream as possible; a party of eighty persons accompanied him. They stopped at different towns along the way. At Bloomsburg, their arrival was greeted by the booming of cannon, and a bountiful supper was prepared for them at Brew's Inn. Toasts were responded to. One was as follows: "Captain Elgar, the proprietor of the Codorus; may his enterprise meet with the highest reward." Another: "The steamship Codorus, the first to navigate our waters.' On April 19, 1826, the Codorus. with its "cargo of sixty persons," arrived at Wilkesbarre. Its approach was greeted by the discharge of cannon, the hearty cheers of the people, and strains of martial music. The next morning a party of eighty persons went a few miles up the river to Forty Fort, the place where the Wyoming massacre occurred during the Revolution. Here they sat down to a banquet. They returned to Wilkesbarre and remained for a few days, and then were propelled by steam up the Susquehanna as far as the New York state line. After an absence of four months, Captain Elgar returned from an apparently successful trip and harbored his boat in the Conewago Canal at York Haven. Owing to the shallow water of the Susquehanna, steam navigation was practicable only for a few months of the year. The success of the Codorus was a great event of that day, but its use on the river was soon discontin- ued and it was sold to be used elsewhere.

JOHN ELGAR, the inventor of the steamboat Codorus, was born at Sandy Spring, Maryland, in 1780. He was a mem- ber of the Society of Friends, and early in life came to York, where he joined the York Meeting, which worshipped in the Friends' Meeting House, on West Philadelphia Street. In his youth, he learned the trade of a machinist and was interested in all the improvements in mechanical science. From the time that steam was first used in river navigation, in 1807, John Elgar studied the properties of steam. While employed as a

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HISTORY OF YORK COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA

machinist in the foundry and machine shops Lancaster. On April 2, in the same year, owned by Davis & Gardner, at York, he the locomotive made its first trip on this conceived the idea of making an iron steam- boat, which was the first to navigate in American waters. While he was building his boat, the newspapers of that time com- mented enthusiastically on its future pros- pects and the success of other boats made after the same model. He tried his experi- ment on the Susquehanna as told in the nar- rative above.

part of the road, with a train of three pas- senger cars. April 16, 1834, was the day appointed for the opening of the road from Columbia to Philadelphia. On April 15, Governor Wolf, with a large number of state officials arrived at Columbia in a packet boat over the canal from Harrisburg, and proceeded by rail the next day to Phila- delphia. Citizens from York rode in stages or private carriages to Wrightsville and first enjoyed the privilege of railroad travel after the road was completed. Thomas McGrath, the proprietor of the Globe Inn, became the first agent at York for the sale of railroad tickets to Philadelphia. Long passenger cars were not used over this road until 1835.

Sometime later John Elgar moved to Baltimore with Phineas Davis, the inventor of the first locomotive in America that from Columbia to Philadelphia immediately burned anthracite coal. He was employed in the shops of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company. While there he at- tracted the attention of Ross Winans, who developed the railroad interests of Russia. He assisted Winans in designing and build- ing what afterward became known to rail-

The railroad to Philadelphia was a great roading as the "camelback " locomotive. advantage to the business men of the state. In 1838, he was sent by the Baltimore and

Towns and villages along its line grew and Ohio Railroad Company to England, to buy prospered, and many persons were enriched rails and other equipments for the extension thereby. But it was not a source of profit of that railroad. John Elgar was also the to the state. Every new administration changed the officers of the road. All the appointments were political, and some of inventor of an appliance for railroad switches, railway turntables, chill-bearings and plate wheels, which were used by the the appointees were incompetent, others Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company and also on the railroads constructed by Ross Winans for the Russian government. John Elgar was a man of excellent character, and was highly esteemed by all persons with whom he was associated. He died Decem- ber 6, 1858. He was the great uncle to A. B. Farquhar, the prominent manufacturer of York, whose grandmother was a sister to John Elgar.

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History of York County Pennsylvania, Volume I, Part 109

Author: Prowell, George R. Publication date: 1907 Publisher: J. H. Beers Number of Pages: 1372

Author: Prowell, George R.
Publication date: 1907
Publisher: J. H. Beers
Number of Pages: 1372