Champlain Canal

Lake Champlain Aquatic Invasive Species Plan Updated

July 3, 2026 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) and New York State Canal Corporation announced revisions this week to the Rapid Response Plan (RRP) that was implemented in 2022 to mitigate the spread of round goby, an invasive species, into the Lake Champlain Basin.

After first being discovered in the Hudson River near Troy in 2021, to date, round goby has not been captured north of Champlain Canal Lock 1 in Waterford, though there were two positive eDNA detections north of Lock 2 in Halfmoon in 2024. [Read more…] about Lake Champlain Aquatic Invasive Species Plan Updated

Erie Canalway Launches “Revolutionary Experiences” Tours

April 20, 2026 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

As America marks its 250th anniversary, the Erie Canalway National Heritage Corridor is launching Revolutionary Experiences, road trips along New York’s historic waterways.

These self-guided itineraries invite participants to explore the people, places, and ideas that helped shape the nation. [Read more…] about Erie Canalway Launches “Revolutionary Experiences” Tours

‘A Terrible Death Struggle’: The Wreck of the George W. Lee

April 2, 2026 by Dave Waite 3 Comments

The mournful sound of the midnight ferry skittered across the Hudson River, and rain clouds spat a parting gift onto Captain John Frawley as he urged his mules northward and passed out of sight.

Over the last sixteen hours, Frawley had brought the canal boat George W. Lee from the Morgan sawmill in Glens Falls, and forty miles down the Champlain Canal to the Albany Basin, where he deposited the year’s last load of lumber. Despite the rain, his trip down had been uneventful, even getting well-behaved mules when he stopped for a fresh team in Schuylerville. [Read more…] about ‘A Terrible Death Struggle’: The Wreck of the George W. Lee

The Road North: From Native Networks to the Champlain Canal

March 16, 2026 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

Where the Hoosic and Mohawk rivers meet the Hudson River was a major Indigenous crossroads. Three major native pathways came together there: 1) The Hoosic River offered the main route east to New England, over the Berkshires and into Massachusetts. 2) The Mohawk River guided the way west. 3) The east side of the Hudson Valley provided a pathway north to Lake Champlain and Canada.

These well-worn trails, on which colonists later built their roads, linked the waterways used by Indigenous hunters, traders, and families moving between settlements. Stone, minerals, and other natural material from as far west as Michigan have been found in this region, revealing a broad network of trade among Native people, long before Europeans arrived. [Read more…] about The Road North: From Native Networks to the Champlain Canal

Lake Champlain: The Irish Lake

March 9, 2026 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

Between 1840 and 1860, a great wave of Irish immigrants washed up on the shores of Lake Champlain. So many, in fact, that the inland sea was nicknamed “the Irish lake.”

The reason, of course, was poverty and job opportunities. Although Irish Catholics had started arriving in New York and Vermont in numbers by 1820, Champlain truly became the Irish lake in the mid-1840s during the Great Famine. [Read more…] about Lake Champlain: The Irish Lake

Surveying The Champlain Canal Route, 1792

January 21, 2026 by Guest Contributor 2 Comments

What follows is a report made by the directors of the Northern Inland Lock Navigation Company of the country between the Hudson River and Lake Champlain. The expedition during which this survey was conducted was led by Philip Schuyler in September 1792 to establish a route for the Champlain Canal.

By the act of incorporation, the navigation of Hudson River, from the mouth of the creek on which the grist mill occupied by Colonel Rensselaer [Nicholas Van Rensselaer, 1754-1848, or Colonel Kiliaen van Rensselaer, 1717–1781] is erected in the town of Troy [possibly the Poesten Kill or Wynants Kill] to opposite the house of Mr. Tibbets [George Tibbits, 1763–1849] in Lansingburg is to be rendered navigable for boats drawing four feet water when loaded. [Read more…] about Surveying The Champlain Canal Route, 1792

Closing the Champlain Canal Season in 1895

October 30, 2025 by Maury Thompson Leave a Comment

The 1895 Champlain Canal navigation season was nearing its end. “The Morgan Lumber Company is hurrying large quantities of lumber to tidewater,” The Morning Star of Glens Falls reported on November 19th.

“Its boats are discharged of their up cargoes of coal as rapidly as possible, and immediately load lumber for the return trip.” There was evidence a few days later that, indeed, the remaining days of the navigation season were numbered. [Read more…] about Closing the Champlain Canal Season in 1895

New York State’s Canal Heritage: An Engineering Family Tree

October 16, 2025 by Bill Orzell Leave a Comment

The canal system of New York State is a complex network of natural and man-made waterways that connect two of the Great Lakes that border the state with the Atlantic Ocean. The canals also incorporate Lake Champlain and the Finger Lakes. The development of this system bridges several generations and gives the canal system a genealogy of its own. [Read more…] about New York State’s Canal Heritage: An Engineering Family Tree

A Sketch of the Great Northern or Champlain Canal, 1822

August 18, 2025 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

The following article, “INTERNAL IMPROVEMENT. A Sketch of the Great Northern or Champlain Canal. Waterford, 28th Nov. 1822” was first published in The American Farmer of Baltimore, Maryland, on December 20, 1822.

On this day the last stone of the Northern or Champlain Canal, was laid by Governor Clinton, President of the Board of Canal Commissioners, in the presence of a great assemblage of people. [Read more…] about A Sketch of the Great Northern or Champlain Canal, 1822

Moses Roper’s Escape from American Slavery

June 19, 2025 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

The following excerpt is from A Narrative of the Adventures and Escape of Moses Roper, from American Slavery published in 1838. Moses Roper (ca. 1815 – 1891) was an African American abolitionist, author and orator. He gave thousands of lectures in Great Britain and Ireland to inform the European public about the brutality of American slavery. [Read more…] about Moses Roper’s Escape from American Slavery

New Season of ‘History on the Road’ Focuses on Warren County

May 14, 2025 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

Ten new episodes of History on the Road, hosted by historian Don Rittner and theaterical director Justyna Kostek focus on the natural and human history of Warren County, New York.

History on the Road features Rittner and Kostek traveling the earliest highways of America, stopping at the historic communities along the way, interviewing historians and experts about their community, and trying to solve some history mysteries along the way. [Read more…] about New Season of ‘History on the Road’ Focuses on Warren County

A Nostalgic Glimpse of Mechanicville, 1902

December 4, 2024 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

One of the fun things about living in a very old house is that every now and then, stashed away in a dark corner, you find a completely fascinating remnant of the past. Such was the case when Bill and Bev Betts found a firemen’s convention booklet from 1902 in their 128-year-old Saratoga County, NY, farmhouse. [Read more…] about A Nostalgic Glimpse of Mechanicville, 1902

Champlain Canal Stories

November 19, 2024 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

The Champlain Valley National Heritage Partnership (CVNHP) has named the Folklife Center at Crandall Public Library the winner of its 2024 Director’s Award.

The Folklife Center at Crandall Public Library utilized a 2023 CVNHP Special Project grant to develop 27 short videos interpreting the Champlain Canal during its bicentennial year. [Read more…] about Champlain Canal Stories

New York’s Historic Vessels Highlight Preservation Failures

October 31, 2024 by Editorial Staff 7 Comments

One of America’s most historic ships, which spent most of its career traveling between New York City and Southampton, England, will serve as a kind of metaphor for our times when it’s hauled to Florida, loaded with explosives and purposely sunk.

It’s just one of several historic vessels with ties to New York State that have recently been abandoned for lack of funding. [Read more…] about New York’s Historic Vessels Highlight Preservation Failures

The Lives of Cannalers: Lake Champlain’s Sailing Canal Boat Families

October 6, 2024 by Anthony F. Hall Leave a Comment

If you were walking in Lower Manhattan in the mid-1950s and happened upon a dead-end street of warehouses named Coenties Slip, you would have stumbled upon a “Canalboat Village” – a cluster of barges which had once hauled limestone from Vermont and oysters to Essex, NY, now permanently moored. [Read more…] about The Lives of Cannalers: Lake Champlain’s Sailing Canal Boat Families

Railroad Man Willoby McMillan’s Epitaph

September 9, 2024 by Dave Waite 1 Comment

During the years that Saratoga Springs was at its height, drawing the cream of society to its endless social events and health-giving mineral springs, the deeply shaded paths of Greenridge Cemetery would often draw young and old seeking a reprieve from the downtown’s relentless summer heat. [Read more…] about Railroad Man Willoby McMillan’s Epitaph

UPDATE: Canal System Users: Prepare for Tropical Storm Debby

August 7, 2024 by Editorial Staff Leave a Comment

The Canal Corporation is actively monitoring Tropical Storm Debby and is preparing to lift the Erie Canal’s Movable Dams between Lock E-8 in Rotterdam and Lock E-15 in Fort Plain beginning at 9 am on Thursday, August 8, 2024.

The lifting of the movable dams will result in the full lowering of the canal to winter levels and therefore its closure in this area. The storm’s exact path remains uncertain, but impacts are expected by late Thursday or early Friday. [Read more…] about UPDATE: Canal System Users: Prepare for Tropical Storm Debby

The Hard Lot of Canal Boat Women

March 24, 2024 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

The following article was written by Emma Louise Trapper and published in the Brooklyn Standard-Union on August 21, 1891. It was transcribed by Hudson River Maritime Museum volunteer researcher George A. Thompson and additionally edited and annotated by John Warren.

She was a small-featured woman, with very light blue eyes and her fair skin bronzed by the water. We were sitting on the roof of the cabin of her husband’s canal boat, at the foot of Coenties Slip [an artificial inlet in the East River that was filled-in during 1835]. [Read more…] about The Hard Lot of Canal Boat Women

Albany and Troy: 19th Century Commercial Rivals

March 16, 2024 by Guest Contributor 2 Comments

The ambitions of Albany and Troy for commercial supremacy in the nineteenth century illustrate clearly the varied pattern of the transportation history of the United States and furnish a striking example of intercity rivalry. Only a few struggles such as that between Tacoma and Seattle to become the eastern terminus of the transcontinentals can match the bitterness of the Troy – Albany feud. [Read more…] about Albany and Troy: 19th Century Commercial Rivals

The Experience of a Waterford Canaller

March 12, 2024 by Guest Contributor Leave a Comment

By the 18660s, John Shepard had been a canaller for some time. He had relocated to Waterford, New York, from Massachusetts in 1838, to seek work in an area that was rich with opportunity. Twenty-five years have passed since then and John was contemplative about his life, especially in the current times. [Read more…] about The Experience of a Waterford Canaller

Champlain Canal

We Need Your Help Now More Than Ever

New York Almanack receives no public funds.

It’s supported only by readers like you.

Please give today (a monthly recurring gift is best)