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The Obedient River
By Patricia Anderson
In 1834, Rochesterville, one
of the New W orId' s frrst boom
towns, was incorporated as a
city, impelled to that status by
its placement along the Erie
Canal, the great manmade
waterway that opened the
American wilderness to technological
advance.
In tribute to the city's Sesquicentennial
observance, the
Memorial Art Gallery mounted,
during the early months of the
summer, a major exhibition
tracing "The Course 0 fE mplre ."
from the point where it started
its westward journey.
H ail
GEORGE HARVEY
Pittsford on the Erie Canal (detail), ca. 1840
New York State Historical Association
to thee, New York! Thy
genius was worthy this gift of
heaven. Roll on fair state, thou pride of Columbia.
Erect new wonders, and the old repair,
and roll obedient rivers through the
land.
Anne Royal, 1828,
on first seeing the Erie Canal
In the words of the contemporary
historian]. C. Furnas, the Erie Canal
"did for upper New York State what
the later Western railroads did for the
plains states."
Other early turnpikes, canals, and
railroads in the region east of the
Mississippi River were built to connect
established commercial centers, such
as Albany with Boston, or Philadelphia
with New York City.
The Erie Canal was an exception.
When it was officially opened to traffic
in 1825, most of the 363-mile stretch it
traversed was still wilderness. But the
canal virtually ensured that the woodlands
and fertile river valleys along its
towpaths would become the province
of farmsteaders and empire builders
and that its terminus at the mouth of
the Hudson River would become a national
focus, eclipsing Boston, Philadelphia,
and New Orleans as this
country's principal seaport. Boom
towns sprang up across the northwestern
frontier as the canal facilitated
the import of people, manufactures,