By Ryan Bachman.
By the early 1820s, as the
Erie Canal stretched across western New York, communities all around
the United States became infatuated with the idea of canals, and
Cornwall was no exception. Deep within the Cornwall Historical Society
vault are several documents related to the short-lived Ousatonic Canal
Company. Despite the enthusiasm of the company’s supporters, the
proposed canal never advanced beyond its early planning stages, in spite
of having the official support of several respected Cornwall residents.
Even though the much-anticipated canal through the Valley never
materialized, the arguments in favor of its construction were
successfully reused a decade later during the region’s courting of the
Housatonic Railroad.
In May 1822, the Ousatonic Canal Company was organized
with the goal of digging a canal alongside the Housatonic (or,
Ousatonic) River from Long Island Sound to the Massachusetts border. For
decades, entrepreneurs along the river had desired a way to move goods
by water to Connecticut’s coastal cities, but shallow depths,
waterfalls, and ubiquitous stones rendered much of the Housatonic
impassible. Finally, businessmen from along the Housatonic River Valley
seized upon the popular fascination caused by the construction of the
Erie Canal and were able to incorporate their company.
According to the project’s promoters, the canal was
essential to the economic growth of the Valley. Once the canal opened,
businessmen from communities like Cornwall would have profited
handsomely from their new abilities to ship items like slate, lumber,
and iron to coastal cities, and receive luxury items from urban areas in
return. As an added bonus, company executives also claimed that the
region’s abundant lime and cinder (a waste product from the charcoal
industry) could be mixed into a cheap and effective type of cement.
Theoretically, the canal would have been dug on the western side of the
river, lined with lime-cinder cement, dotted with various locks to
control the water level, and flanked by a towpath where animals could
tug along barges laden with goods. The estimated cost of the project was
put at $599,400.
Despite the backing of some of Cornwall’s most
influential residents, such as Philo Swift, John Calhoun, and Oliver
Burnham, the canal was never attempted. According to Yale professor
Robert B. Gordon, after the initial survey of the area revealed that the
project would not be as easy to construct or inexpensive as early
estimates indicated, support for the plan was abandoned. Ironically,
fourteen years later, petitioners from the Valley used nearly identical
language about their need for a connection to coastal markets to
successfully bring about the construction of the Housatonic Railroad.
Only in 1842, upon the railway’s completion, would Cornwall residents
have a fast and relatively inexpensive way to ship items to the
Connecticut coast.