Miami and Erie Canal

Images of America: Ohio

by Bill Oeters, Nancy Gulick

Travel through the history of Ohio's historic canals and follow its growth throughout the years told with hundreds of photographs. In the 1800s, the United States was a nation obsessed with finding a form of transportation that was the fastest, cheapest, and most reliable; at the time, canals were the answer. Canals broke through vast, open countryside, forested woodlands, and rolling hills to expose the heart of the nation to development. They took passengers and goods off of dusty or muddy roads and delivered them to their destinations faster and cheaper than by any other means. From Toledo to Cincinnati, the Miami and Erie Canal provided western Ohio with that sorely needed waterway and became part of the 1,000 miles of Ohio canals contributing to the national network of canals. Today, with the help of government, corporations, and citizens, many parts of the Ohio canal system have been preserved or restored and can be visited and experienced. Watered sections of canal quietly reflect a bygone era and lead an explorer down the towpaths of history.

128 pages, Paperback

First published September 8, 2014

Reviews

[Ross · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lots of of good photos & information. Only thing I would have liked is a map of the canal system with the referenced locations marked.

[Paul Lunger · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bill Oeters with "Miami and Erie Canal" takes a look at this somewhat at times lost piece of Ohio history in this installment of the "Images of America" series. In it he gets into the origins of the canal in its early days & explains not only the necessity of it at the time but also how it would transform towns in what is now the I75 corridor into who they were then & would become now. As someone not entirely familiar with full history of the canal the book provided to me some insights into some of the industries in the Miami Valley and the importance of having a direct link from Cincinnati to Lake Erie. I also appreciated the fact that at the end the efforts that are being done to preserve this piece of history some of which I know I've visited.

[Carole Dunham · Rating 5 out of 5]

I wanted to learn more about the canals in Cincinnati. This book is about the canal built from Cincinnati to Toledo, called the Miami and Erie Canal. The images were a bit hard to make out but they offer scenes of the locks and the towns along the route.