Pennsylvania Canal: The Juniata Division

Near here stood a lift lock of the Juniata Division of the Pennsylvania Canal, one of the engineering marvels of early nineteenth-century America. Approved in eighteen twenty-seven and opened in eighteen thirty-two, the Juniata Division stretched one hundred twenty-seven miles, connecting to the eastern end of the Allegheny Portage Railroad at Hollidaysburg.

The canal was Pennsylvania's answer to New York's wildly successful Erie Canal. Boats carrying coal, lumber, grain, and manufactured goods passed through this lock each year, bound for Philadelphia, New York, and Baltimore. Just west of here, the canal crossed the Juniata River on an aqueduct that remained in use for decades. The stone abutments and piers of that aqueduct still stand, remnants of a transportation revolution that reshaped Pennsylvania's economy before the railroads made it obsolete.