Union Canal (Pennsylvania)
The Union Canal was a towpath canal that existed in southeastern Pennsylvania in the United States during the 19th century. First proposed in 1690 to connect Philadelphia with the Susquehanna River, it ran approximately 75 mi (120 km) from Middletown on the Susquehanna below Harrisburg to Reading on the Schuylkill River. Although construction began in 1792 during the George Washington Administration, financial difficulties delayed its completion until 1828. Called the "Golden Link," it provided a critical early transportation route for the shipment of anthracite coal and lumber eastward to Philadelphia. Although closed in the 1880s, remnants of the canal remain, most notably the Union Canal Tunnel, a hand-built engineering marvel that is the oldest existing transportation tunnel in the United States. The tunnel is listed in the National Register of Historic Places.
Read more about Union Canal (Pennsylvania): Points of Interest
Famous quotes containing the words union and/or canal:
“The admission of the States of Wyoming and Idaho to the Union are events full of interest and congratulation, not only to the people of those States now happily endowed with a full participation in our privileges and responsibilities, but to all our people. Another belt of States stretches from the Atlantic to the Pacific.”
—Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901)
“My impression about the Panama Canal is that the great revolution it is going to introduce in the trade of the world is in the trade between the east and the west coast of the United States.”
—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)