Comments on: The Middlesex Canal

By: Lyric

Lyric — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 21:06:39 +0000

Im obliged for the blog post.Thanks Again. Fantastic.

By: J Sullivan

J Sullivan — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 01:59:01 +0000

http://www.masspaths.net/photos/middlesex20120401/

Two or three photos of the canal at Mount Pleasant.

The photos at 2012 April 01 are part of the April 1st Middlesex Canal tour.

By: J Sullivan

J Sullivan — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 08:06:13 +0000

http://www.middlesexcanal.org/photos/lowest gate.jpg
The approximate location of the lowest gate of the
three Merrimack locks is north of the ne corner of
the former Sterling Transportation, based on an
1840 survey of the nearby Cyrus Baldwin property,
now Hadley Field. Good picture of Hadley the
locktender in Jan 2012? /Towpath Topics/.

By: Gene S

Gene S — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 20:18:45 +0000

Initially, the first paragraph read -

Fifty years of back issues of Towpath Topics, the newsletter of the M’sex Canal Ass’n, (in which research results are often published) can be found at http://middlesexcanal.org/towpath/. They contain a wealth of information about the canal and how it evolved. There is an index of content.

The URL is repeated in the web site field, above. –– You might also add:

From the green side of the Mt. Pleasant Golf Club House, if one walks west along the north perimeter of the green, before you reach Black Brook there will be a well preserved section of canal prism on your right. At this point, and all the way from Nichol’s Lock (about 11 miles to the east), the towpath was on the west/south side of the channel.

By: DickH

DickH — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 19:30:54 +0000

Sorry, but I can’t find any URL in your initial comment. If you want to put the URL in a new comment, I’ll watch for it and be sure it makes it onto the site.

By: Gene S

Gene S — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 13:46:51 +0000

You left the URL out of my reply. Please add back in.

Thanks

By: Gene S

Gene S — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 06:01:32 +0000

Fifty years of back issues of Towpath Topics, the newsletter of the M’sex Canal Ass’n, (in which research results are often published) can be found at . They contain a wealth of information about the canal and how it evolved. There is an index of content.

The canal lasted slightly longer than indicated. The last toll was collected in November, 1851; and the last known boat to pass through was in April of the following year. The canal was legally abandon in 1860.

The Pawtucket Canal may have suffered a reduction in traffic and revenue once the M’sex Canal began operation, but it is less clear that it suffered a ‘financial demise’. In 1818, 1819 and 1820, the Pawtucket Canal, which cost about $60K to build, paid $4, $3, and $3 to its investors. At the same time, the M’sex Canal, which cost $600K to build, paid $15, $10 and $10 to its investors.While more information is needed to compare the financial states of the two, the figures suggest that Pawtucket Canal continued to do an acceptable business.

By: J Sullivan

J Sullivan — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 04:45:03 +0000

Jason,
Check out http://www.middlesexcanal.org/photos/graypond
The Middlesex Canal Association leads bike rides along
the canal. http://Www.middlesexcanal.org

By: Jason

Jason — Wed, 19 Oct 2011 16:36:12 +0000

When I was a kid, my backyard abutted the former Middlesex Canal in Billerica. We lived on Canal St (Now Harvard Rd.) just off Gray Street near the MBTA railroad tracks. I was always fascinated by stories of the canal and my backyard sloped down to where you could imagine the horses puling the barges on the berms. Our neighbors had some of the berm still at the back of their property. The aqueduct on the Billerica, Wilmington line was a short distance Southeast. There was also a significant portion of the canal that was still largely intact running through the wooded area behind the high tension wires on Gray Street and behind the Billerica Landfill, (now closed). Some of that wooded area now has housing on it but I bet a good portion is still there abutting the back of the landfill. It was a great place to walk as a kid. We used to do our own digs back there and found quite a bit of old glass bottles and fragments.

By: Joe S

Joe S — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 23:14:31 +0000

Many years ago I read Thoreau’s “A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers”, where he took a side trip up the Middlesex Canal. One phrase stuck with me, something to the effect that – time will wear away the vestiges of this canal, but it will still be visible through the overgrowth. At the time I checked the passageway near the golf club, and could discern the solid berms on either side of the old canal in some spots, the places where the horses pulling the barges trampled. I suspect they are still there, although even more growth and swamp may be making that more difficult to observe.