THE ERIE CANAL
A Scavenger Hunt
The period of American History from 1825 to 1850 is often called the Age of
Canals. When the Erie Canal connected Buffalo and Albany in 1825 a water route was created that opened the upper Ohio Valley and Great Lakes region to settlement and trade. It allowed farm products to flow east, and people and manufactured goods to flow west. This scavenger hunt is designed to introduce you to some basic facts and history about the canal. The hunter will be given a series of short answer questions which can be answered using the web addresses provided. After the short answers have been finished a “Big Question” will be provided in order for you to summarize your knowledge.
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1. Who conceived the idea of a canal stretching from west to east across
New York State? Why was there no simple way to transport people, raw materials or manufactured goods from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great
Lakes? (http://www.nycanal.com/history/eriecanaltimeline.html)
2. Why is the Erie Canal important? http://www.archives.nysed.gov/projects/eriecanal/ec_1825.shtml

3. Did the canal prove to be a good investment for New York? Explain please. (http://www.nycanal.com/history/eriecanaltimeline.html)
4. Why did Governor DeWitt Clinton want to dump water from Lake Erie into the Atlantic Ocean? http://www.archives.nysed.gov/projects/eriecanal/ec_1825.shtml
5. What were tourists who traveled by canal boat curious to see in the1830s? http://www.archives.nysed.gov/projects/eriecanal/ec_1830.shtml

6. What problems did the Erie Canal cause?
(http://www.archives.nysed.gov/projects/eriecanal/ec_1830.shtml)
A.
B.
C.
D.
7. What commercial functions were served by the following cities that were located along the canal’s route?
(http://www.eriecanal.org/UnionCollege/Bankwatch.html)
Albany -
Troy, Cohoes, & Amsterdam -
Schenectady –
Syracuse -
Rochester -
Buffalo -
8. How many boats operated on the canal in 1845? How many people worked on those boats? List the jobs of those people who were employed to maintain and operate the canal itself?
(http://www.eriecanal.org/UnionCollege/Bankwatch.html)

9. What improvements were proposed for the Barge Canal System in the early 1900s?
(http://www.archives.nysed.gov/projects/eriecanal/ec_1918.shtml)
A.
B.
C.
D.
10. What products were shipped on the Barge Canal? Why did traffic on the
Canal decline after 1951?
(http://www.archives.nysed.gov/projects/eriecanal/ec_1918.shtml)
The Big Question: How did the Erie Canal help transform New York into the
“Empire State”?