A Sixty-Mile Voyage on the Old Canal

Our imaginary launch party which had found shelter and food at the hotel over night at Joliet, must make an early start on this, the second day of the voyage, as there is a distance of sixty miles yet to be covered before we reach the end of the canal at La Salle. Such a distance could easily be sailed over in our speedy little craft in much less time than the ten or twelve hours we are allowing for the trip, but sailing in the narrow trough of the canal prism must of necessity be slower than in a stretch of open water, as the wash from a rapidly passing boat is apt to injure the banks and high speed is therefore prohibited by the canal authorities. Then, again, we shall be delayed by the locks through which we must pass, as through so many gateways. The total length of the Illiois and Michigan canal, from its opening at Bridgeport on the Chicago River, to its end at the LaSalle is ninety-seven miles. Throughout its course there are seventeen locks which overcome a difference in level between the two points, amounting to 145 feet in vertical height.
Before entering the lock and descending the eight or ten feet to reach the level of the next stretch of ten miles on the canal, we may pause long enough to say a few words about the city of Joliet. When it was first settled the place received the name of Juliet, though for what reason is not clear. Some have thought that the name was bestowed upon it because the older town of Romeo, a few miles north, needed that name as an appropriate neighbor, the names "Romeo and Juliet" seeming to belong together. Others again say that it was so named in honor of a daughter of one of the canal commissioners. After some years of existance under this name, the inhabitants made a change to Joliet, a far more appropriate name, commemorating the old French discoverer, who, with Marquette, passed up the Desplaines river on his way to Lake Michigan. For a century or more before the place was settled, a remarkable mound of gravel, standing a short distance below it, near the river, bore the name of "Joliet Mound," or as it appears on some maps, "Mt. Joliet." This mound has in recent years utterly disappeared, the gravel having been mined and carried off for road making purposes.
Just below Joliet the river widens out and runs over a rocky bed, where there is a considerable declivity, thus creating a stretch of rapids which entirely prevents boat navigation. The flood from the drainage canal, flowing over these rapids, is thereby exposed to the oxidizing influencess of the air, and the water is thus largely purified of the sewage brought down from Chicago. By the time the waters reach the Illinois river, some twelve miles below, they have lost almost all of their offensiveness. Indeed, fish life abounds in the Illinois river, in spite of the sewage contents of the waters flowing into it. The channel of the Desplaines river is here flanked by lines of bluffs, leaving a valley a mile or more in width, plainly showing the course of hte mighty flood which poured over the divide in the post-glacial epoch, when Lake Michigan was from forty to sixty feet higher than it is at the present day.It was our own Dr. Henry M. Bannister of Evanston, who wrote the first scientific description of this event, deduced from his observations, for which he received due credit from the geologists of this state some fifty years ago.
Continuing our voyage along the old canal for a distance of ten miles, we arrive at the crossing of the DuPage river, an affluent of the DesPlaines and passing through the locks, which retain the levels in the canal, we find ourselves in the old town of Channahon, once a busy shipping point in the palmy days of the canal's prosperity. The town is now much decayed, and its former residence portion has largely reverted to farming lands. The place has interest for a number of Evanston residents, it having been the birthplace of Mrs. H. H. C. Miller, whose father's family were old residents there. Mrs. Miller's father was Joseph Lewis, at one time postmaster, grain-buyer and dealer in general merchandise, and it was here that Mr. Miller came as the principal of a high school, and first met the lady who afterwards became his wife. It was in this town that James Currey settled when he first came west, and it was here that the two youngest children of his family, Mary and Arthur, were born. The natural situation of Channahon is a lovely one, lying as it does near the confluence of the DuPage and DesPlaines rivers, and surrounded by wooded hills and fertile farming lands. The town has never had any direct railroad connections, its nearest point on the Rock Island railroad line being a station some three miles away.
Now, having entered the next lower level on the canal, we soon find ourselves coming into view of the mouth of the Kankakee river, here mingling its waters with those of the Desplaines, and thus forming the Illinois river. As we gaze on the glistening flood stretching far to the west, we can imagine the two explorers, Joliet and Marquette, examining the two rivers ahead of them, when they had arrived at this point, in order to determine their course towards the great body of water, which they knew, from what the Indians had told them, was only two or three days journey distant. [illegible] known to white men, they had crossed Lake Michigan at the beginning of their journey of exploration, along its upper portion, three hundred miles away from the point where they were soon to enter it again. It was as yet only a surmise that it would turn out to be the same body of water. Both of the streams they were at this moment scrutinizing would have led them to the unknown lake, but on the advice of their Indian friends (for Frenchmen were always making friends with the tribes wherever they met them), they took the route by way of the Desplaines, and, as Marquette relates in his journal, they soon arrived at the portage, over which they passed into the Chicago river, known even then to the Indians by its present name. The party consisted of five men besides the two leaders, traveling in two canoes. Marquette had expended all his enthusiasm in describing hin his journal their first view of the Mississippi, which they had discovered a couple of months before arriving at this point, but the sensations of the travlers must have been just as remarkable when the glorious lake burst upon their view, though nothing more than the bare fact is mentioned in the journal. All the old explorers had a wonderful faculty of anticipating the geographical features of the regions through which they were moving, indeed, it was almost a "sixth sense" with them. From the flow of the streams, form the aspect of the country about them, they could almost unerringly determine the character of the region beyond their sight and knowledge. Even as they approached the great lake itself the flight of gulls in ever increasing numbers circling over their heads would have given an indication of the great body of water which they were nearing; just as Columbus noticed the flocks of land birds in flight as he approached the shores of America while his ships were still far at sea.
In the course of the following two or three weeks the exploring party had made their way from the mouth of the Chicago river along the western shore of what Marquette called "the Lac des Illinois" to their starting point at Green Bay, after their most eventful voyage, lasting four months. These remarkable leaders were both young men, Joliet twenty-eight and Marquette thirty-six. The bold and adverturous spirit of the French was shown in thus penetrating so far into the unknown regions of the west, without maps and guided only by the tales of wandering Indians. The expedition was sent out by the Canadian-French government at Montreal, and it was greatly to its credit that such able and courageous leaders were chosen for the purpose.
Our launch is now speeding along the canal, passing the city of Morris, where stands the monument to that staunch old friend of the white man, the Indian Chief Shabbonn. Soon after we pass the towns of Seneca and Marseilles, and directly approach the city of Ottawa. This city was named for a tribe of Indians, but we have departed in our way of pronouncing the name from original manner of doing so. Old Fernando Jones always said that the second syllable of the name should be accented instead of the first, but modern usage has decreed otherwise. Here we see the Fox river flowing into Illinois from othe north. We must remember that there are two Fox rivers mentioned on the maps and in the geographies--one the Fox river of Wisconsin, which flows into Green Bay (up which the two explorers mentioned ascended on their way to the discovery of the Mississippi), and the Fox river of Illlnois. The canal and the Illinois river run close together from the beginning of the latter to the end of the canal at La Salle, and the river, with its picturesque islands and other natural features ,are in view constantly. On this portion of its course the river is following an east and west direction. At some distance below Ottawa we pass near Buffalo Rock, but we cannot liger long here, although it is a most attractive natural object, and only a year or two was purchased by the Crane company of Chicago to be used for a recreation park for its employees.
But far away on the opposite side of the river we catch our first glimpse of Starved Rock, the most interesting natural monument in the state of Illinois This rock is now the property of the state, together with a large tract of land lying near it, and its attractions are open to all visitors. Professor James A. James of the Northwestern University is president of the State Park Commission, which controls "Starved Rock Park." Long before it was called Starved Rock, however, it bore the name of the "Rock of St. Louis," a name given to it by La Salle, under whose directions a fort was built upon its summit by Tonty, although it was abandoned some years later. We must remember that though La Salle was one of the most famous explorers of his time, he did not visit this region until six years after Joliet and Marquette had passed through the country and had laid it open to the knowledge of the world. The present name of Starved Rock is derived from an event which occurred about 1770, nearly a century after La Salle's visit, when a band of Illinois Indians took refuge on the rock and was besieged by the Pottawattamies. Here they were gradually reduced to starvation [illegible]after many had died, a few attempted one stormy night to escape by flight under cover of darkness. They were met, however, as they descended form othe rock by the watchful besiegers, and nearly all of them were tomahawked. Eleven of them succeeded in reaching some canoes tied up at the river's brink, and these eventually arrived at St. Louis. This wretched remnant wer too few in numbers to continue a tribal organization, and the remaining members joined other tribes and their identity was thus completely lost. This episode in the history of the early Indian wars has been called the "last of the Illinois" by Judge Caton, who wrote an account of the tragedy.
Our voyage on the canal ends at the City of LaSalle, where we will seek shelter in one of the hotels in the place. We are now about a hundred miles form Chicago and considerably more than that from our starting place at Wilmette. The canal was opened for use twenty-five years after the completion of the old Erie Canal in New York State, which was its model and inspiration. INdeed,the old Erie canal may be said to have been "The mother of canals," for after it was opened a great number of other canals were built all over th ecountry. Our canal was built by the state of Illinois, and it cost $6,500,000. This sum was fully repaid from the tolls received during its period of prosperity. It was twelve years in the course of construciton, a longer period than has been required to build the Panama canal. In the old days, when the canal was in use for the transportation of grain and merchandise, canal boats were towed down to the Mississippi from La Salle, which was the head of navigation on the Illinois river, and wer thus able to carry cargoes to and dfrom all the cities lining the banks of the "Father of Waters." For a few years, before railroads were built, there were finely appointed passenger boats running on the canal called "packets," drawn by horses hitched up "tandem," and proceding along the towpath at a brisk trot. Pictures and descriptions of these boats give a very atrractive impression of the comforts of travel by this means of conveyance, rivaling, indeed, the parlor cars of the present day. A long cabin the full length of the boat was painted white, the many windows of which were protected by green blinds, and form within the passengers could sit at ease and look out upon the scenery as they traveled in this comfortable fashion all the way from La Salle to Chicago.
But the old canal later fell upon evil days, and it has now been reduced to a state of neglect and decay. Its use is entirely confined to launches, house-boats, and a variety of small craft. In it sold age it is, however, a picturesque fuin, and still posseses many attractions for the tourist. In the next article we shall resume our voyage down the Illinois river, for it has as yet a [unclear] to its confluence with the Mississippi.