National Canal Museum

Last updated December 02, 2022

The National Canal Museum is the Signature Program of the Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage Corridor, specifically in Easton, Pennsylvania.

After a three-year transition during which the Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage Corridor operated the canal museum under a management agreement, the two merged to become one. The D&L is now responsible for The National Canal Museum and for Hugh Moore Park, The Emrick Technology Center, Locktender's House Museum and the canal boat ride, Josiah White II.

Officially known as Hugh Moore Historical Park & Museums, the National Canal Museum is located in Easton's Hugh Moore Park.

History

The National Canal Museum opened in 1970 as a joint cooperative effort between the City of Easton's Hugh Moore Park Commission and the Pennsylvania Canal Society.^[1] Sitting at the fork between the Delaware and Lehigh Rivers, this small Museum was intended to highlight and operate Hugh Moore Park.

The museum had been a destination for people interested in the canal, as well as school trips looking for information about transportation. In 1978 with the addition of the Josiah White, the canal boat ride became a distinctive part of a visit to the National Canal Museum.

In 1982 The museum's exhibits were redesigned to make the museum a National Museum of the towpath canal era. This redesign also acted as a catalyst for the expansion into the industrial heritage of the Lehigh Valley.

During this period, the National Canal Museum began hosting several major events, including the annual Canal Festival and annual Canal History and Technology Symposium, the latter being held at Lafayette College. By 1985, the museum was realizing the ability for a complete collection and archival ability of important artifacts of both the canal era and the industrial revolution.

In 1996, the National Canal Museum moved to downtown Easton into Two Rivers Landing in an effort to revitalize the downtown district. Since that time, Two Rivers Landing receives an average of 250,000 visitors each year. Beginning in 2002, the museum began a campaign to recreate the museum to add hands-on activities to the existing exhibits. A proposal to the National Science Foundation(NSF) resulted in a grant of $1.4 Million, later supplemented to $2 million for the creation of exhibits based on their proposal "Science and Technology of Canals and Inland Waterways."

This led to a new exhibit space installed in March 2006, incorporating the history, science, and technology of canal construction and navigation.

At the end of 2011, the 15-year lease period in Two Rivers Landing ended and was not renewed. On January 1, 2012, the museum was relocated back to the canal in Hugh Moore Park, repurposing the Emrick Technology Center to act as the main exhibit and administrative space during the Crayola Factory shutdown.

In 2013, the Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage Corridor began operating the National Canal Museum under a management agreement during the first Crayola Experience opening. This marked the beginning of a three-year transition in which the two organizations would become one. The transition allowed the D&L to integrate the management, finance, marketing, and development functions of the two organizations. The merger of the two in 2017 culminated this transition period. The museum, along with the other operations of Hugh Moore Historical Park & Museums, is now the Signature Program of the D&L.

Collections

The museum's collections reflect the material culture and document the history of America's canals and navigable rivers, as well as canal-related industries in the Lehigh Valley. The museum's holdings include 3,753 artifacts; 3,890 reels of film, video cassettes and audio (oral history) tapes; 52,782 slides, photographs and negative images; 31,824 engineering drawings; a library of more than 13,483 volumes; 736 linear feet of manuscript materials; and 261 rolls of microfilm. Among the museum's archival holdings are rare film footage of canal life, historic photographs, canal maps, captain's logs, a complete set of the Army Corps of Engineers' annual reports to Congress, and engineering plans for 15 towpath canals east of the Mississippi River.

NCM is responsible for maintaining and interpreting the historic structures and sites within the 260 acres that comprise Hugh Moore Park, a National Register Historic District. These include Section 8 of the Lehigh Canal and its three operating locks, a locktender's house, ruins from three 19th century industrial areas, and the remains of the Change Bridge, one of the first iron cable suspension bridges constructed in America.

Accreditations and affiliations

The National Canal Museum is accredited by American Alliance of Museums and is an affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution

Hugh Moore Park

Hugh Moore Park is a City of Easton park nestled between the Lehigh River, and the Lehigh Canal. It covers 520 acres (2.1 km²), including part of the Lehigh River and section 8 of the Lehigh Canal. The area now known as Hugh Moore Park was originally an industrial park, built due to the large amount of anthracite coal being brought down the Lehigh Canal from present day Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania

The park was purchased by the City of Easton in 1962, using money donated by Hugh Moore. This sparked the formation of the Pennsylvania Canal Society in 1966, and eventually led to the creation of the National Canal Museum. Through the course of several master plans for the part, improvements to the park and its facilities have continually enhanced visitor experience. These improvements include a bike/hiking trail, boat launch, pavilions, as well as preservation of industrial ruins and three locks, including the only working lift lock in Pennsylvania and New Jersey

The Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage Corridor, which has merged with The National Canal Museum, is responsible for maintaining and interpreting the historic structures and sites within the 260 acres (1.1 km²) that comprise Hugh Moore Park (ignoring water surface), a National Register Historic District. These include Section 8 of the Lehigh Canal and its three operating locks, a locktender's house, ruins from three 19th-century industrial areas, and the Change Bridge, one of the first iron cable suspension bridges constructed in America.

The Emrick Center

The Elaine and Peter Emrick Technology Center is a 14,000-square-foot (1,300 m²), two-story brick building constructed to resemble a factory, the likes of which would have been seen throughout the park. The building holds a reception area, exhibit spaces, offices, and the Hugh Moore Park and Museums Archives.

The building opened in 2007. The inaugural exhibit, "From this Valley: Iron, Steel and the Birthplace of the American Industrial Revolution," tells the story of the Lehigh Valley's emergence as a powerhouse of industrial might. In 2012, the National Canal Museum relocated from Two Rivers Landing to the Emrick Center, and transferred most of the exhibits and hands-on educational activity stations there. The relocated Museum, which is adjacent to the mule-drawn canal boat, the Josiah White II, opened on Memorial Day weekend, 2012. It came under operation of the Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage Corridor in 2013 and in 2017 completed its merger with them.

Locktender's House

The Locktender's House, with a museum on the first floor, is a restored locktender's house nestled between the Lehigh River and Guard Lock 8 on the Lehigh Canal. The Locktender's House represents the living and working conditions of people from the 19th and early 20th centuries.

The Locktender's House was built for the person with the responsibility of operating the lock. In order to ensure that lock was operated, the house was constructed as near to the lock as possible. Because of this, the opinion was that there was no reason for someone in the house to be unable to come out and operate the lock.

Opened in 1974, this museum is decorated period appropriately and is meant to provide a rough equivalent of what working on the canal would entail. Costumed guides provide background and information during a tour of the rooms of the house.

Josiah White II

The Josiah White II is the current boat used for the Canal Boat ride. It is a steel-hulled boat built in 1993 by Bethlehem Steel at the Sparrows Point shipyard in Maryland.

The original canal boat, named the Josiah White, served operationally during the summer from 1978 until 1993, when it was allowed to sink near the feeder gate for the canal. It currently serves as a visual aid for the canal boat ride

The canal boat ride was developed to provide context and historical information to the canal, including information about building, living, and working on the canal. Pulled by two mules, named Hank and George, the ride attempts to recreate the feel of moving down the canal during its operational period. Average rides are 40 minutes long, and discuss a multitude of topics which usually include:

Mules
Mule Tenders
Features of the canal
History of the canal

Timeline: Hugh Moore Historical Park & Museums

1962	The City of Easton Purchases Hugh Moore Park using money donated by Hugh Moore.
1963	The City of Easton Enters into an agreement with the Joint Planning Commission of Lehigh and Northampton counties to prepare a preliminary report on the park. As an outgrowth of this study, riding stables were established through a private concessionaire in the park.
1965	Ordinance No. 1877. City of Easton annexes Hugh Moore Park.
1966	Pennsylvania Canal Society formed.
1966	Initial Master Plan Prepared. The thrust of this master plan was to preserve the 260 acres (1.1 km²) of park lands along the lower 6 miles (9.7 km) of the Lehigh River. Also to preserve its transportation and industrial history.
1967	Ordinance No. 1966. City of Easton sets up the Hugh Moore Park Commission.
1969	Utilizing the first master plan, grants were obtained from Project 500 of the State of Pennsylvania, Federal Land and Ware Conservation Funds, and private donations to start the initial restoration and development within the Hugh Moore park.
1970	The Canal Museum at the Forks of the Delaware opens as a joint cooperative effort between the City of Easton's Hugh Moore Park Commission and the Pennsylvania Canal Society.
1973	A second master plan is developed. It primarily deals with land use and protection of the river corridor by surrounding municipalities.
1974	The Locktender's House Museum opens. Monies for exterior and interior restoration came from the initial development grants for the park. The interior exhibits were researched and laid out by the Junior League of the Lehigh Valley
1975–1976	The Hugh Moore Park Charitable Trust is formed with assets from the estate of Hugh Moore. The income from the trust is designated for the operation and development of the Hugh Moore Park.
1976	Section 8 of the Lehigh Canal opens after a three-year restoration effort.
1976	The Friends of the Hugh Moore Park are formed as a non-profit corporation to assist in the development of Hugh Moore Park.
1978	The canal boat, Josiah White, Purchased by the Friends of Hugh Moore Park, is put into operation.
1979	The first annual Canal Festival is held.
1982	The Canal Museum's exhibits are redesigned to make the museum a national museum of the towpath canal era. This redesign also acts as a catalyst for the beginnings of the interpretation of our industrial heritage.
1982–1988	Playgrounds, bike paths, improved roads, a water line to the Locktender's House and many other projects are completed utilizing state grants, community development block grants, and private contributions.
1983	The reorganization of the Friends of Hugh Moore Park to take on the function of serving as a museum board in place of the joint agreement with the City and Pennsylvania Canal Society begins.
1984	The Articles of Incorporation and Bylaws of the Friends of Hugh Moore Park are amended to restructure the organization and rename it as the Hugh Moore Historical Park and Museums, Inc.
1985	The City of Easton sells the Hugh Moore Historical Park and Museums the property for a collection and archival storage facility.
1985–1988	The Hugh Moore Historical Park and Museums begins a systematic expansion of its collection reflecting the wider scope of activities relation to canals and industries within the region.
1986	Changing exhibits are instituted at the Canal Museum to explore various aspects of our related industrial history that cannot be adequately covered by permanent exhibits.
1988	The U.S. Congress passes and President Reagan signs a bill creating the Delaware and Lehigh National Heritage Corridor.
1990	Huch Moore Historical Park and Museums signs an agreement with the City of Easton to assume management of programs and facilities
1992	Accreditation approved by AAM (American Alliance of Museums)
1994	Josiah White II put into use. The new boat has two decks to allow more passengers and catered meals to be served on board.
1996	A new National Canal Museum Opens in downtown Easton. Included in the new building is the Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage corridor Visitor's Center and The Crayola FACTORY.
1997	Canal Boat Store expanded.
2000	Capital Campaign begins to raise money for the Center for Canal History and Technology at Hugh Moore Park. This new facility will feature technology and science exhibits.
2000	The first annual Immersion Days is held. This hands-on living history program is designed for students (grades 3–12).
2002	Hugh Moore Historical Park and Museums is awarded a planning grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities for a new multi-media program in the National Canal Museum.
2003	National Science Foundation awards National Canal Museum with a grant of $1.4 million (later awarded $200,000 supplemental grant) for development of new science and technology exhibits.
2006	New interactive NSF exhibits installed. New Exhibits convey fundamental concepts to illustrate how gravitational forces, simple mechanical tools, and the properties of water were manipulated by early engineers in order to build and efficient inland waterway transportation system.
2007	Emrick Technology Center Opens	2012	National Canal Museum relocates to Hugh Moore Park, leaving Two Rivers Landing
2013	A three-year transition begins, during which the Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage Corridor operates the National Canal Museum under a management agreement. The D&L begins to integrate the management, finance, marketing, and development functions of the two organizations during the Crayola Experience opening.
2017	National Canal Museum and Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage Corridor complete their merger. The D&L is the surviving entity under which the enterprises operate. The National Canal Museum begins functioning as a Signature Program of the D&L.

Related Research Articles

The Chesapeake & Delaware Canal is a 14-mile (22.5 km)-long, 450-foot (137.2 m)-wide and 35-foot (10.7 m)-deep ship canal that connects the Delaware River with the Chesapeake Bay in the states of Delaware and Maryland in the United States.

The Schuylkill River is a river running northwest to southeast in eastern Pennsylvania. The river was improved by navigations into the Schuylkill Canal, and several of its tributaries drain major parts of Pennsylvania's Coal Region. It flows for 135 miles (217 km) from Pottsville to Philadelphia, where it joins the Delaware River as one of its largest tributaries.

The Morris Canal (1829–1924) was a 107-mile (172 km) common carrier anthracite coal canal across northern New Jersey that connected the two industrial canals at Easton, Pennsylvania, across the Delaware River from its western terminus at Phillipsburg, New Jersey to New York Harbor and New York City via its eastern terminals in Newark and on the Hudson River in Jersey City. The canal was sometimes called the Morris and Essex Canal, in error, due to confusion with the nearby and unrelated Morris and Essex Railroad.

The Lehigh River is a 109-mile-long (175 km) tributary of the Delaware River in eastern Pennsylvania. The river flows in a generally southward pattern from The Poconos in Northeastern Pennsylvania through Allentown and much of the Lehigh Valley before enjoining the Delaware River in Easton.

The Union Canal was a towpath canal that existed in southeastern Pennsylvania in the United States during the 19th century. First proposed in 1690 to connect Philadelphia with the Susquehanna River, it ran approximately 82 mi from Middletown on the Susquehanna below Harrisburg to Reading on the Schuylkill River.

Anthracite iron or anthracite pig iron is the substance created by the smelting together of anthracite coal and iron ore, that is using anthracite coal instead of charcoal to smelt iron ores—and was an important historic advance in the late-1830s, enabling a great acceleration of the industrial revolution in Europe and North America.

The Main Line of Public Works was a package of legislation passed by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in 1826 to establish a means of transporting freight between Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. It funded the construction of various long-proposed canal and road projects, mostly in southern Pennsylvania, that became a canal system and later added railroads. Built between 1826 and 1834, it established the Pennsylvania Canal System and the Allegheny Portage Railroad.

The Schuylkill Canal, or Schuylkill Navigation, was a system of interconnected canals and slack-water pools along the Schuylkill River in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania, built as a commercial waterway in the early 19th-century. Chartered in 1815, the navigation opened in 1825 to provide transportation and water power. At the time, the river was the least expensive and most efficient method of transporting bulk cargo, and the eastern seaboard cities of the U.S. were experiencing an energy crisis due to deforestation. It fostered the mining of anthracite coal as the major source of industry between Pottsville and eastern markets. Along the tow-paths, mules pulled barges of coal from Port Carbon through the water gaps to Pottsville; locally to the port and markets of Philadelphia; and some then by ship or through additional New Jersey waterways, to New York City markets.

The Delaware Division of the Pennsylvania Canal, more commonly called the Delaware Canal, runs for 60 miles (97 km) parallel to the right bank of the Delaware River from the entry locks near the mouth of the Lehigh River and terminal end of the Lehigh Canal at Easton south to Bristol. At Easton, which today is the home of The National Canal Museum, the Delaware Canal also connected with the Morris Canal built to carry anthracite coal to energy-starved New Jersey industries.

The Lehigh Canal, or the Lehigh Navigation Canal, is a navigable canal that begins at the mouth of Nesquehoning Creek on the Lehigh River in eastern Pennsylvania. It was built in two sections over a span of twenty years, beginning in 1818. The lower section spanned the distance between Easton and present-day Jim Thorpe. In Easton, the canal met the Delaware and Morris Canals, which allowed goods to be transported further up the U.S. East Coast. At its height, the Lehigh Canal was 72 miles (116 km) long.

Delaware Canal State Park is a 830-acre (336 ha) Pennsylvania state park in Bucks and Northampton Counties in Pennsylvania. The main attraction of the park is the Delaware Canal which runs parallel to the Delaware River between Easton and Bristol.

Lehigh Gorge State Park is a 4,548 acres (1,841 ha) Pennsylvania state park in Luzerne and Carbon Counties, Pennsylvania. The park encompasses a gorge, which stretches along the Lehigh River from a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers flood control dam in Luzerne County to Jim Thorpe in Carbon County. The primary recreational activity at Lehigh Gorge State Park is white water rafting.

The Pennsylvania Canal was a complex system of transportation infrastructure improvements including canals, dams, locks, tow paths, aqueducts, and viaducts. The Canal and Works were constructed and assembled over several decades beginning in 1824, the year of the first enabling act and budget items. It should be understood the first use of any railway in North America was the year 1826, so the newspapers and the Pennsylvania Assembly of 1824 applied the term then to the proposed rights of way mainly for the canals of the Main Line of Public Works to be built across the southern part of Pennsylvania.

The Delaware & Lehigh Canal National and State Heritage Corridor (D&L) is a 165-mile (266 km) National Heritage Area in eastern Pennsylvania in the United States. It stretches from north to south, across five counties and over one hundred municipalities. It follows the historic routes of the Lehigh and Susquehanna Railroad, Lehigh Valley Railroad, the Lehigh Navigation, Lehigh Canal, and the Delaware Canal, from Bristol to Wilkes-Barre in the northeastern part of the state. The backbone of the Corridor is the 165-mile (266 km) D&L Trail. The Corridor's mission is to preserve heritage and conserve green space for public use in Bucks, Northampton, Lehigh, Carbon, and Luzerne counties in Pennsylvania. It also operates Hugh Moore Historical Park & Museums, which includes the National Canal Museum.

The Susquehanna Canal of the Pennsylvania Canal System was funded and authorized as part of the 1826 Main Line of Public Works enabling act, and would later become the Susquehanna Division of the Pennsylvania Canal under the Pennsylvania Canal Commission. Constructed early on in America's brief canal age, it formed an integral segment of the water focused transportation system which cut Philadelphia-Pittsburgh (pre-railroad) travel time from nearly a month to just four days. One of the system's navigations, the Susquehanna Canal/division created a mule-towed navigable channel 41 miles (66 km) along the west bank of the main stem of the Susquehanna River between a lock terminus near the mouth of the Juniata Tributary River and the canal basin at Northumberland. Meeting the West Branch Canal and the North Branch Canal at Northumberland, it formed a link between the public and private canals upriver and the main east–west Pennsylvania Canal route known as the Main Line of Public Works which was devised to connect Philadelphia to Pittsburgh, southern New York, northern Pennsylvania and Lake Erie using most of the far reaches of the Susquehanna's tributaries.

The Mauch Chunk and Summit Railroad was a coal-hauling railroad in the mountains of Pennsylvania that operated between 1828 and 1932. It was the first operational railway, in the United States, of any substantial length to carry paying passengers.

The Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company was a mining and transportation company headquartered in Mauch Chunk, Pennsylvania. The company operated from 1818 until its dissolution in 1964 and played an early and influential role in the rise of the American Industrial Revolution and early U.S. industrialization. The company ultimately encompassed source industries, transport, and manufacturing, making it the first vertically integrated U.S. company.

Josiah White (1781–1850) was a Pennsylvania industrialist and key figure in the American Industrial Revolution.

The Canal Age is a term of art used by historians of Science, Technology, and Industry. Various parts of the world have had various canal ages; the main ones belong to civilizations, dynastic Empires of India, China, Southeast Asia, and mercantile Europe. Cultures make canals as they make other engineering works, and canals make cultures. They make industry, and until the era when steam locomotives attained high speeds and power, the canal was by far the fastest way to travel long distances quickly. Commercial canals generally had boatmen shifts that kept the barges moving behind mule teams 24 hours a day. Like many North American canals of the 1820s-1840s, the canal operating companies partnered with or founded short feeder railroads to connect to their sources or markets. Two good examples of this were funded by private enterprise:

The Lehigh Coal & Navigation Company used vertically integrated mining raw materials, transporting them, manufacturing with them, and merchandising by building coal mines, the instrumental Lehigh Canal, and feeding their own iron goods manufacturing industries and assuaging the American Republic's first energy crisis by increasing coal production from 1820 onwards using the nation's second constructed railway, the Summit Hill and Mauch Chunk Railroad.
The second coal road and canal system was inspired by LC&N's success. The Delaware and Hudson Canal and Delaware and Hudson Gravity Railroad. The LC&N operation was aimed at supplying the country's premier city, Philadelphia with much needed fuel. The D&H companies were founded purposefully to supply the explosively growing city of New York's energy needs.

The Room Run Railroad was an early American gravity railroad with self-acting planes. It was built by the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company to transport coal from the Room Run Mine in Nesquehoning, Pennsylvania to landings at Mauch Chunk on the Lehigh River so it could be shipped on the Lehigh Canal to the Delaware River at Easton, Pennsylvania to markets in Philadelphia or New York City via the Delaware or Morris Canals.

References

↑ National Canal Museum Timeling
↑ "About the Archives". canals.org. Archived from the original on 2007-02-28.

External links

Coordinates: 40°39′44″N75°14′20″W / 40.66224°N 75.23900°W / 40.66224; -75.23900

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.

[1] National Canal Museum Timeling

[2] "About the Archives". canals.org. Archived from the original on 2007-02-28.

[1]

[2]