Lockington, Ohio: Seven Locks on the Canal

Lockington exists because of water and gravity. The Miami and Erie Canal, completed here in the eighteen forties, needed to climb a significant ridge as it moved north through Shelby County. Engineers built a closely spaced series of locks near Lockington to lift the canal about sixty feet.

A mill community grew up around them, first known as Locksport. The village was officially approved as Lockington in eighteen fifty-seven. When the railroads killed the canal trade after eighteen fifty-five, the little town quieted.

The locks themselves still stand today, a remarkably intact remnant of Ohio's canal era, managed by the Ohio History Connection.