DIRECTORY

Canalling in the Old Days

Colonel Thomas W. Lloyd
Secretary of the Lycoming Historical Society

HISTORICAL PUBLISHING COMPANY
TOPEKA—INDIANAPOLIS 1929

 How many persons now living ever rode on one of the old packet boats on the canal? How many persons now living ever saw one? Not many.

It was a delightful way to travel if one were not in a hurry and no one was in the early days, for time was one of the things that everyone possessed in abundant measure. Furthermore being in a hurry would have made no difference as there was no other way to travel.

These boats were large and roomy and, besides passengers, they carried the United States mails and express matter. Thus they had the right of way over all other craft and were not compelled to wait for passage through the locks. When the horn of an arriving packet boat sounded, all other traffic was sidetracked in favor of the approaching queen of the seas.

The boats were furnished comfortably, even luxuriously, with carpets on the stateroom floors and attractive curtains at the windows. The meals supplied were of the most excellent character and the whole service of the boat was highly efficient.

The upper deck was provided with easy chairs and comfortable couches so that passengers could relax and enjoy the passing scenery, or indulge in a card or other game to while away the moments if time dragged.

There was usually a gay party on board, made up of old and young and it was customary for the men and women to sit on the deck during the day with the former holding parasols over their fair companions to keep the glaring sun from their eyes.

The boats were drawn by four fine horses and frequent relays were made so that the animals could be kept on the trot and fair progress made. After the boat was once started it was kept going largely by its own momentum and very little "pull" was necessary to keep it in motion.

Along some portions of the water highway the trees grew so thick on either side that they interlaced overhead, thus forming a bower of leafy beauty extending perhaps for miles through which the craft slowly passed to the great delight of those on board.

Sometimes the passengers, in order to stretch their limbs, would get off and walk along the towpath beneath the shade of the overhanging trees and sometimes friends of those on the boat would accompany them for some distance, walking on foot along the side of the canal and conversing at short range.

The captains of the canal boats were men of experience, not only in handling boats, but in all the details of managing what was really a floating hotel. These men were autocrats and ruled their little kingdom with a firm hand. They were of as much importance in their limited sphere as the captain of an ocean liner in these days. One of the last of these commanders was D. B. Else, of Williamsport. He was a gentleman of the old school, courteous, considerate and affable to all and he thoroughly understood all the details of his business. It was a real pleasure to sail with him.

The canal wharf in Williamsport was situated at the old Exchange Hotel, a building which is still standing, and the arrival of a passenger boat was an event of great interest.

When one was sighted through a field glass rounding the curve at the lower end of town and rapidly bearing down on its landing place, a large bell was rung and this was the signal for hundreds of people to gather and watch the docking and unloading.

The boats brought the city newspapers and the people of the town were thus able to get their weekly knowledge of the great outside world.

These boats ran twice a week from Williamsport to Northumberland, where transfer was made to another vessel which continued on to a point below Columbia, where the passengers were again transferred to cars which carried them to Philadelphia.

There were also boats running regularly between Williamsport and Lock Haven and at one time there were two rival lines operated between these points. Opposition once became so strong in their effort to secure trade that the fares were cut until one could make the trip for nothing. Then one line offered to carry the passengers free and give them their dinners. The other came back with the offer to carry them free, give them their dinners and serve them with three drinks of whiskey, one on leaving Williamsport, another on the arrival at Jersey Shore and the third when the boat reached Lock Haven. That settled it. The line making that offer got all the business. A compromise was soon reached, however, which resulted in a mutual agreement on rates.

The need for the canal system in Pennsylvania had long been felt before it became an accomplished fact. Prior to the advent of the waterways the only way of transporting freight from one place in the state to another was by means of wagons or the stage coach and the amount that could be carried in this manner was very limited. The rapidly growing population which was gradually stretching out its arms to include the western and northern sections made some better means of transportation absolutely necessary.

The task was a gigantic one for that period in the state's development and presented engineering problems that were surmounted with difficulty. The subject had long been discussed in and out of the legislature and it was not until the year 1828 that public sentiment was sufficiently crystallized to admit of work being begun. As early as 1790 surveys had been made to ascertain whether Lake Erie could be connected with the West Branch of the Susquehanna River. By act of March 31, 1823, the sum of $50,000 was appropriated to improve the navigation of the river from Columbia to its mouth.

Other experiments were made but without success and it was finally determined to resort to the construction of canals as the only means of providing facilities for the transportation of the increasing quantity of products from the interior of the state to the city markets. The legislature, therefore, passed a law, March 24, 1828, authorizing a board of canal commissioners to proceed "to locate and contract for making canals, locks and other works necessary thereto."

From Northumberland to Bald Eagle Creek on the West Branch of the Susquehanna River, surveys were made and the work begun. But delays occurred. The famous Muncy dam was put under construction at once and completed the same year. The canal reached Williamsport in 1833 and Lock Haven in 1834. The superintendent of the Lycoming line, as it was termed in the reports, was William F. Packer, afterwards governor of the state.

When the canal reached Montoursville the first packet boat was dispatched carrying a large number of distinguished passengers, officials of the state government and other notables and the arrival of the boat was made the occasion of a memorable demonstration. Its journey up the new waterway had been a journey of triumph. At every town along the way the people turned out in immense numbers and the booming of cannon and the ringing of bells greeted the boat's arrival. Its progress was not unlike the triumphal entry of a Roman general into a conquered city.

A large delegation went down from Williamsport to meet the boat when it reached Montoursville, in carriages, wagons, on horseback and on foot. It was something new for them for many of them had never seen a craft larger than a rowboat and when they visualized the new queen of the inland waters, lying moored at her wharf; she seemed like a great Leviathan of a later day. The crowd was accompanied by "The First Lycoming Troop" and the "Lycoming Dragoons" arrayed in all the panoply of war and brilliant in their resplendent uniforms.

Cannon were fired upon arrival of the boat and a general celebration such as had never been staged before in Lycoming County, was held.

There were a good many engineering difficulties to be surmounted in the building of the canal which, for those days, were seemingly almost insurmountable. Locks had to be built to raise or lower the waters from different levels and aqueducts were constructed at frequent intervals where the canal had to be carried across rivers or streams. At one point on the old Union Canal a tunnel was cut through the mountains through which the canal was run. The most ambitious project was on the mountain at Hollidaysburg.

The canal was built westward to this point, but there the Allegheny Mountains rose as a seemingly impenetrable barrier to further progress. The canal was continued on to Pittsburgh from Johnstown on the western side of the mountains and, in order to get the boats over the top of the range, a portage railroad was built on which the boats were loaded, carried up an inclined plane to the top by means of steam power and then let down on the other side in the same way. These boats were constructed in three sections and when one arrived at the foot of the plane, a car was let down into the water immediately under the first section, that part of the boat lowered on to it and then carried to the top of the mountain where it was placed on another car and let down again in the same way as it had been brought up. Then followed the other sections. This transfer was accomplished without unloading the boats or disturbing the cargo.

There was a good deal of political chicanery going on at Harrisburg in the days in which the canal was built and there was much wire pulling by the conflicting interests.

The West Branch Canal was one spoke in the political wheel, the hub of which was at the state capital. Every political change at Harrisburg necessitated a corresponding movement in every part of the periphery of this immense wheel. Tunison Coryell, of Williamsport, was one of the most ardent advocates of the building of the canal in this section of the state and he was a lobbyist of the most skillful type and ever on the alert in the interest of his pet scheme.

The building of the West and North branches of the canal was vigorously opposed by those interested in the Juniata and Western divisions, but the adherents of the two branches were able to prevent any appropriations for the West that did not include the branches. Mr. Coryell attended twelve sessions of the legislature at his own expense in the interest of the West Branch Canal During the sessions of 1831-1832 the appropriation failed and this aroused so much indignation that Mr.

Coryell and his associates immediately got busy with petitions and remonstrances and aroused so much sentiment that Governor Wolf was compelled to call an extra session of the legislature.

Mr. Coryell was on hand for this meeting and succeeded in having the appropriations passed and within one hour of the signing of the bill by the governor was on his way to Williamsport, announcing the result on the way. This appropriation enabled the work on the canal to be begun.

The chief engineer in the work of building the local branch of the canal was Robert Faries, who also had charge of building the Williamsport and Elmira and the Sunbury and Erie railroads.

He lived in Williamsport and built the castellated home which formerly stood in Way's Gardens and was afterwards purchased by the late John White, a prominent lumberman of his day.

At every street crossing within the towns and at country roads bridges were necessarily erected to cross the canal. Some of these were quite high and others so much lower that there was barely room enough for a packet or empty freight boat to clear them because the craft stood so high out of the water.

Whenever one of these low bridges was approached the warning cry, "low bridge", was sounded, whereat all the passengers or boatmen either sought safety below decks or ducked their heads low until the danger was passed. These bridges were unsightly and difficult to cross on account of their height and they were finally supplanted within the town limits by swinging bridges. These were built on a level with the street and pivoted on one side of the thoroughfare so that when they were hit by the bow of a passing boat they swung around to one side and allowed the craft to go through. The bridge then swung back to its original position automatically and locked itself in place.

It was great pastime for boys who happened to be in the neighborhood when a boat approached to get on the bridge and swing around with it and oftentimes to jump aboard the boat and ride to the bridge at the next street. Another great occasion for the boys was when a watermelon boat arrived. In season a boat would reach Williamsport with a cargo of watermelons alone. In unloading the melons were rolled down a gang plank on to the wharf and every now and then one would roll off and break. These melons, by common consent, belonged to the boys and they were not slow to avail themselves of their privilege.

The tolls on the old canal amounted to a considerable sum and these and the charges for locking were the only revenue the state derived from the canals. The toll house in Williamsport stood at the canal and Academy Street.

A walk down Canal Street, where the canal formerly ran, reveals many old buildings that formerly played an important role in the days when the old waterway occupied the center of the stage as a means of transportation. Notable among these is the old Weaver warehouse at the corner of Canal and Court streets. This was an important wharf in the days when the canal was in its ascendancy and many a valuable cargo, consigned to foreign ports, was loaded at this famous old warehouse.

Some old way bills show that tolls as high as $150.00 were paid for a single boat at Northumberland alone, but the actual cost of operating a boat was not very great. The running expenses consisted principally of feed for the motive power and the wages and board of the crew and, as the latter ate at the same table with the owner of the boat, the feeding expenses were reduced to the minimum.

The passenger service of the packet boats was maintained at the highest standard and those still living who traveled by this means speak in the most enthusiastic terms of the conveniences and-attention shown them. To those who are wearied with the rush and bustle of modern life, with all its annoyances and vexations, its exactions and demands, a ride on a packet boat, with all its opportunities for rest and recreation, its enjoyment of ever-changing pictures of nature in its gentlest moods, would come like a taste of paradise.

The names of the two packet boats that plied between Williamsport and Northumberland in the days when the canal was in its glory were, the "Reindeer" and the "Clinton," the latter, no doubt, named after the builder of the Erie Canal. The Clinton was commanded by the late Captain D. B. Else and both of these boats are described by old canal men as floating palaces.

The interior of a packet boat was arranged with two large rooms, one used as a lounging room and furnished with chairs, tables and comfortable couches. It was also furnished with hanging and table lamps so that one could read or sew as comfortably as if at home. The other was the dining room in the stern of the boat and was furnished as completely as the most luxurious rooms of like character in the most pretentious houses of the day. The tablecloths and napkins were of real linen, the glassware of the best and the knives, forks and spoons of sterling silver. All in all the boats were furnished and equipped with all the luxury of a modern hotel.

The berths, in which the passengers slept, were arranged not unlike those in the present day Pullman cars, being folded up against the sides of the boat during the daytime and let down and made up into beds at night.

Another of the famous commanders of these boats in the days when they rode the waves in all their glory was Captain Philip Shay, of the good ship, "Philip Shay," which plied between Northumberland and Baltimore. Captain Shay was the father of Edward Shay, so long identified with the banking and financial interests of Williamsport, and fully maintained the best traditions of the inland seas in his courteous bearing and gentlemanly character. His boat, besides carrying passengers, also brought oysters to points along the canal from Havre de Grace to Northumberland.

The packet boats had a capacity of about 300 passengers when fully loaded but this number was rarely carried. Half that number was considered a very satisfactory booking. Each of the boats had a horn with a peculiar sound and when one approached a lock, the horn was sounded and this often occasioned a scrambling among the freight boats which had reached the lock first and sometimes resulted in a fight between the captain of the freighter and the lock tender as to which was really entitled to the right of way. Bare fists were the only arguments which the canal knew and they were brought into play on the slightest provocation.

All parts of the state could be traveled in these packet boats as the canals ramified into every section. One could go from Williamsport to Harrisburg, there transfer to a boat on the Union Canal which ran over to Reading, or transfer at Northumberland and go up the North Branch to Wilkes-Barre. Or from Reading one could run down the Schuylkill to Philadelphia. The Union Canal between Harrisburg and Reading had eleven locks within a distance of one mile so that progress here was as slow as the proverbial tortoise, but this was of no especial moment in those days. People were never in a hurry and if the truth were known it is entirely probable that they accomplished just as much and got far more out of life than those of us of the present day who are constantly on the go to get somewhere and when we get there often find that all the rush was for nothing.

After the packet boats ceased to do business on the West Branch, the "Reindeer" and the "Clinton" were taken over to the North Branch, where they were used until, in the parlance of the canal, they "died" between Standing Stone and Towanda.

One of the outstanding men in the old canal days was James Fagles, more familiarly known to his friends as Captain "Jim." Captain Fagles was a long, lanky specimen of physical manhood, nearly seven feet tall and of enormous strength. He was known as a fire-eater and would fight at the drop of the hat, yet, withal, was never known to have started a quarrel. It was a bold man indeed who would ever run afoul of the righteous anger of Captain "Jim" Fagles. He had been a stage coach driver between Liberty and Trout Run on what is now the Susquehanna Trail, before the advent of the canal, and no more dexterous "whip" ever flecked the reins over a four-horse team.

Coming down the mountain from Liberty where the grade is the steepest he would put his horses on the run and swing around the sharp curves at a hair-raising gait that kept his passengers constantly on edge but he never met with an accident.

When the canal was started Captain Fagles worked on it with a shovel and helped dig that portion of it from Williamsport to Lock Haven. After its completion he became a freight boat captain and was subsequently promoted to the command of the "Reindeer" and made the last trip ever made by a packet boat on the old West Branch Canal between Williamsport and Lock Haven.

Thus Captain "Jim" was among those present at the birth of the famous waterway and was in at the death. He was a splendid type of the rugged courageous set of men who made the canal a possibility and fully maintained the high traditions of his calling. These men have passed on even as the old boats they commanded have succumbed to the demands of modern civilization, but while they lived they were splendid types of American manhood, clean-cut exemplars of honesty, integrity and loyalty to their chosen work.

It must be remembered that most of the business on the old canal was that of freighting. Every little town along the waterway had its quota of freight boats. During the heyday of its ascendancy there were one hundred boats in the little village of Montoursville alone and others were owned in the various towns in proportionate numbers. Muncy was a famous boating place and a boat building yard was located at Port Penn and here some of the staunchest boats on the canal were turned out.

The freight from Williamsport and Lock Haven consisted principally of lumber but on the return trip the cargo was made up of whatever miscellaneous goods could be picked up, salt, groceries, coal, furniture, whiskey, and, indeed, all the things that are now transported by rail.

Oftentimes a boat would take a load of freight down as far as Harrisburg and there it would pick up a load of a different kind and proceed to Baltimore. The Baltimore boats would be taken in tow at Havre de Grace and towed down the Chesapeake Bay to the city. These tows generally consisted of a dozen or fifteen boats as the cost was too great to permit of them being towed singly. Frequently they would encounter fierce storms and a whole tow of a dozen boats has been known to have been lost while trying to negotiate this short distance of about twenty miles.

Sometimes a boat would pick up a cargo at Harrisburg for Reading and here another one for Schuylkill Haven and so on over to New York and up the Hudson to Albany. Indeed boats have been loaded at Williamsport with lumber billed through to Buffalo by way of the West Branch Canal to Harrisburg, thence through the Union Canal and down the Schuylkill to Philadelphia, thence by tow up the Delaware River to Bordentown, N. J., thence through the Delaware and Raritan Canal to New York and again up the Hudson River by tow to Albany and thence over the Erie Canal to Buffalo. This was called by canal men making the trip around the world.

Practically all the men who commanded the freighters owned their own boats and thus each man was a capitalist in his own way and was usually possessed of a keen business acumen and some of them accumulated a fortune for those days.

The pleasures of canalling are repeated in this generation in the use of the houseboat, which is only a modern packet boat furnished possibly a little more luxuriously and with, perhaps, more conveniences, but a sojourn on one of these boats for a little while is a delightful Way of spending a vacation and is an illustration of the fact that all of us like at times to get back to living in the old way and enjoying the pleasures that were common to our ancestors.

It is also somewhat of an irony of fate that the canal is again coming into its own and the day is not long distant when freighting on these inland waters will again become common and it is easily within the range of probability that, with the deepening and widening of these canals, the old packet boat may see a resurrection in the form of steam vessels which will shoot on from point to point almost with the rapidity of the railroad. Certain it is that no one will attempt to retard this return to the old ways and the old customs.

The old canal was a long stride in advance. It came to fill a demand that could not be resisted-for adequate means for the transportation of the growing commerce of the Commonwealth and in this it succeeded. It was a wonderful piece of constructive engineering for those days and while it lasted it functioned to the satisfaction of all those who desired to use it.

The canal has given way to more modern methods of transportation, even as it succeeded more primitive methods, and even as the modern facilities may some day succumb to still greater advancement and be thrown into the discard along with those which preceded it. The possibilities of the future are too great even to contemplate.

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Pirates along the Pennsylvania Canal

Pennsylvania Canal Along the Susquehanna

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March through November ** except holidays **
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