Page 15 - 14 Wabash County Visitors Guide
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St. Patrick’s Catholic Church, Above left: Items that would have been used while on the canal boat.
Lagro, IN. Below: An example of sleeping quarters. Part of the Life on the Canal
exhibit at the Wabash County Historical Museum.
Photo: Eric Schoening
Photos: Joseph Slacian
tow line sank and set anchor. The Railroads were a faster mode of the canal was still serving the
eastbound team, using the inside transportation. By 1861, the railroad community, as the former towpaths
of the tow path, stepped over the had reported earning more than were used as the right-of-way for the
loose rope, pulled the boat over the $31,000 in one week, nearly $10,000 interurban street car system that
submerged line and the westbound per week more than one year earlier. served Wabash for many years.
boat then continued its journey. The Use of the railroad continued to
canal’s tow path was 10-feet wide, increase, just as use of the canal In addition to the Kerr Locks
and the path varied on which side continued to decrease. in Lagro and the remnants of the
it was on, depending on the terrain locks near Richvalley, there is
alongside the river. According to records, the canal little evidence of the canal system
transported, among other things, in Wabash visible today. The rear
Ironically, the canal system 91,711 barrels of f lour, 882,765 doors on the buildings on the south
helped bring about its own demise. bushels of wheat in 1847. By 1859, side of Canal Street offer some of the
In 1854, just one year after the canal the amount of flour carried on canal evidence, as they were built there
reached Evansville, four boatloads boats dropped to 28,680 barrels to face the canal docks which ran
of iron arrived in Wabash, iron while the amount of wheat dropped directly behind them.
which was used in creating the to 14,805 bushels.
railroad system here. In 1856, the Likewise, St. Patrick’s Catholic
first passenger train arrived. Although the canal was a failure, Church, built for the Irish laborers
the fact that the canal did travel who helped dig the canal, still
While the canal system continued through Wabash made it a center for stands. Though no longer an actual
for another 20 years, the impending industry and trade. church, Mass is said at the site one
doom could be easily seen. Sunday per month.
And in the years after it left,
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