In 1774 a Virginia gentleman, George Washington, with large landed interests on both sides of the Alleghenies, began urging the construction of a canal to link the Atlantic seaboard with the trading centres of the Ohio valley. Though the need for trade routes was obvious, engineers sneered at such an undertaking, and the plan was forgotten. Half a century later, the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal Co. was founded, and in 1850 an $11,500,000, 184-mile canal between Georgetown, D. C. and Cumberland, Md. was opened. For 73 years hundreds of coal barges plied between...
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