Washington City Canal to Canal Park

In the late 1700’s water transportation was key to the early economic development of the United States.  Canals were a key component of water travel during that time.  So in order to help the Federal City develop, L’Enfant included the building of canals. These canals (Washington City Canal and James Creek) were to connect the Eastern Branch (Anacostia River) to the Potomac River via Tiber Creek. 

According to L'Enfant's plan the canal should have connected with the Eastern Branch near Second St, then crossed New Jersey near M St on a diagonal to connect with the James Creek Canal near today's South Capitol St. According to the Boschke Map of 1857, the canal went north along Second St, across M St and then went diagonal near K St, then across New Jersey Ave before running along South Capitol St and then into Tiber Creek.


In late 1795, a lottery was set up by the Maryland legislature to raise funds ($52,500) to help build the canals but by the early 1800s it was reported that no money had been "raised" by the lottery sales. 

An image of my actual lottery ticket from 1795

In 1809, Congress authorized the funding for   the construction of the Washington City Canal.  After a brief delay due to the War of 1812 construction was completed in 1815 with the grand opening on 26 October 1815.  From 1815 till the late 1840s, the canal was operational but suffered from tidal variations between the rivers and never reached it’s full potential. However, it may have been the design of the canal rather than the tidal variations that caused the canal to "fail."  According to notes by the canal's designer Benjamin Latrobe, the use of wood instead of stone during construction was the main culprit for its demise.  Of interest, according to Latrobe's notes there was a lock at the terminus near the Easter Branch which was would have been located at the new Yards Park; however, according to the Boschke Map of 1857 there may have been an additional lock (or just a bridge) on L St which which is now covered by asphalt.
Regardless of the material used to construct the canal, by the 1850’s with the expansion of railroads, interest in canals began to wane and the canal fell into disrepair and eventually became an open sewer for the city.  It was reported that toxic gases emanated from the canal/sewer and that people even died from falling into its waters.  In the late 1870s the “pestiferous ditch” had become such a public health hazard that it was filled in using sand, gravel, trash, silt and other material and eventually paved over.  By 1939, the old canal site had some industrial type buildings (picture below) and sometime later it became a school bus parking lot.

DC Alley Dwelling Authority (DC Housing Authority) 1939
(Copied from JDLand.com

To those of you who have walked your dogs in the middle section of the proposed Canal Park you have may have noticed a lot of debris coming up through the ground since the snow melt in late Feb 2010.  Some of this debris has included glass, wood, pottery, oyster shells, an old muffler (ceramic interior) and some pieces of old brick pipes.  Not if the debris could be from the fill used to fill the canal or other debris dumped there after 1874 or much later (1994).  It will be interesting to see if any of the canal walls will be uncovered during construction which is scheduled to begin at the end of Aug 2010.

Sources:

Library of Congress

JDLand.com

Benjamin Henry Latrobe and the Development of Internal Improvements in the New Republic 1796-1820 By Lee W. Formwalt

A history of the Washington City Canal, 1791-1882 by Cornelius Heine

History of Southeast Preview

This blog came about from reading JDLand.com, my interest in the Washington City Canal and my love of history.  JD's page on Near Southeast came about as she puts it, "See what happens when someone with a digital camera gets way too interested in a neighborhood."  Her page has for the most part focused on Near-Southeast for about the last 10 years with some smattering of some older history going back a few decades.  I love history but even though I don't have a degree in history maybe one day I will but in the meantime I'll just have to remain a closet historian.  Anyway, while it was JD's blog that peaked my curiosity of the area it was "dog park" section of Canal Park (and the debris coming up through the ground) that really peaked my interest and the last two months of research has been an interesting ride.  The real intent of this blog is to collect the smattering of early SE history and post it in one spot.

While my focus is on the old history of SE some of it will showcase some of the problems still facing SE today and hopefully be able to explain how SE became what it is today.  Some of the topics I'll write about are the Washington City Canal, the Marine Barracks expansion, some interesting tidbits around SE that time forgot about (cobble stone streets/old train tracks), SE/SW Freeway, Alley life in SE, Sugar Refinery, Barry's Chapel, Thomas Law, William Greenleaf, William Prout (Who's Who of early DC), early churches of DC, a small jump across South Capitol in SW and everyone's favorite topic:  the Va Ave train tunnel.