Monongahela River Navigation System
Near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
The Monongahela River looks peaceful today, but beneath its surface lies one of the most consequential engineering projects in early American history. Construction of a system of locks and dams began in eighteen thirty-eight, making this one of the nation's earliest major river navigation systems. Before that, the Mon was too shallow and rocky for reliable year-round shipping.
Over the years the system grew into a water highway between Pittsburgh and Fairmont, West Virginia, allowing millions of tons of coal to move north into Pennsylvania's coke, iron, and steel industries. The federal government took over the system in eighteen ninety-seven, and the Army Corps of Engineers has been expanding and modernizing it ever since, keeping this industrial lifeline flowing well into the present.
