#470 The Grand Tale of the Erie Canal

<p>On October 26, 1825, the fate of New York City – and the entire United States – changed with <strong>the opening of the Erie Canal</strong>, a manmade waterway that connected the Hudson River to Lake Erie.</p><p>It was the most significant engineering project of its time, linking the ocean to the nation’s interior -- <strong>a 363-mile route from Albany to Lake Erie</strong>. Without even knowing where the Erie Canal is on a map of New York state, you could probably guess its course because of a row of cities which developed and prospered, almost in a westward line – including <strong>Utica, Syracuse, Rochester,</strong> and <strong>Buffalo</strong>.</p><p>In some cases, these were modest-sized places like <strong>Schenectady</strong> or <strong>Rome</strong> that benefited financially from canal construction; in others, such as Syracuse (which was founded in the year 1820), the canal was chiefly responsible for its existence.</p><p>However, it was also one of the most critical even...