It was a goal of Washington and Franklin to connect the Chesapeake Bay with the Ohio River, and the Potomack Company was formed with that goal in mind. The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal was the economic heir of the Potomack Company, which had unsuccessfully attempted to achieve that goal until 1828. After a glowing speech, President John Quincy Adams turned the first spade of dirt on July 4, 1828 in Washington, DC. On the same day, construction of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad began in Baltimore, creating problems for the Canal Company from its birth. The race across the Alleghenies was on!

Lumber, building stone, lime for cement, and other building supplies were scarce and expensive, and problems acquiring these hampered the Canal's progress. Difficulties were encountered in securing lands, and once secured (often at a higher price than estimated); unexpected hardpan, slate or gravel hindered construction even more. The canal was also competing with the railroad for lands along the Potomac. Because of the Potomac's predominately agricultural infrastructure, skilled labor was almost nowhere to be found. The Canal Company hired Irish, Germans, Dutch, Welsh and British as stone cutters, masons, carpenters and laborers. Food was poor and housing was makeshift dwellings. Diseases were rampant in the labor camps. Rivalries and prejudices between the European peoples caused much fighting between camps. On top of all these problems, the B&O Railroad continued to push its way westward.

As each section was completed, the canal was put into use. The first section from Georgetown to Seneca was completed in 1831; then to Harper's Ferry in 1833; and to near Hancock, Maryland in 1839, 134 miles from its beginning. About this time, the canal was beset by serious financial problems, and the next 50.5 miles to Cumberland, Maryland were not completed until 1850. The railroad had reached this point eight years earlier. The C&O Canal Company dropped its plans to continue another 180 miles.

The company had spent $12 million on 184.5 miles of canal. Included in the cost were 74 lift locks, which raised the canal from sea level to an elevation of 610 feet in Cumberland. There were 11 stone aqueducts to carry the canal over major tributaries of the Potomac. It took seven dams to supply water to the canal. The 3,118-foot Paw Paw Tunnel carried the canal under a mountain. There were also assorted stop gates, river and guard locks, bridges, shops, section houses and lock houses. The canal was 50 to 60 feet wide, sloping to 30 to 40 feet wide at the bottom, and carried at least six feet of water. The locks were 15 feet wide and 90 feet long, thus restricting the size of the boats.

A typical canal boat was 14.5 feet wide, 92 feet long (including the length of the rudder, which was turned to allow the boat to fit into the lock) and drew 4.5 feet of water. It could carry up to 135 tons of cargo, although 120 tons of coal was the maximum load. Each boat had three cabins; the forward cabin was the mule stable where the mules were kept. The middle cabin was called the hay house, and the stern cabin was used by the crew for sleeping, cooking and eating. The stern cabin was about ten by twelve feet in size, and there was a small private bedroom about four by six feet off the main cabin.

A canal boat's crew was typically five people, two mule drivers, two steersmen and a cook. The mule driver and steersman worked six-hour alternate shifts. Sometimes an entire family boated on the canal. More often the captain took family members who were old enough to help with the boat, while the mother stayed home with the younger children. On some boats, the captain's wife went along to help with the cooking and the steering. During the winter months, the canal did not operate due to the possibility of ice on the river as well as in the canal.The trip from Cumberland to Georgetown took about five days, depending upon the hours, crew size, and the number of mules used as well as operating conditions on the canal. A loaded boat traveled about 2+ miles an hour downstream and a light boat traveled about 3 miles an hour upstream. A canal man had to know every foot of the canal, just as a river man had to know the currents and sand bars of the river. A night boat ran around the clock from one end of the canal to the other, while a day boat tied up sometime during the night.

In its heyday in 1875, over 500 boats on the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal carried 973,805 tons of cargo, 904,898 tons of coal; 1,000 tons of flour; 8,894 tons of wheat; 1,270 tons of lumber; 3,573 tons of corn and miscellaneous other cargo. By 1877, a boatmen's strike and a devastating flood sent the canal into a decline from which it never recovered. Again in 1879, a miner's strike and a drought, along with another drought in 1881, another miner's strike in 1882, and floods in 1889 helped push the canal to the brink of extinction. Competition from the B&O Railroad caused the canal constant monetary problems, making the maintenance of the canal a burden to it financially. Finally, the same rains that caused the historic flood in Johnstown, Pennsylvania in 1889 left the canal a total wreck. The Canal Company was unable to come up with the funds to restore the canal to operating condition and was forced to declare bankruptcy.

The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad (the major bondholder) offered to restore the canal, knowing that a railroad competitor would probably buy the canal in a forced sale. Repairs were completed in 1891 and operation was begun again in 1892. The Canal Towage Company was organized to manage boating operations. The principal cargo carried during the final period of 1892 to 1924 were coal, lime, building materials and flour.On March 29, 1924, a major flood on the Potomac River destroyed the canal for the fifth time in its existence. Other floods had occurred since 1889, but none were as devastating as the 1924 flood. The last night boat to carry coal on the canal was Pat Boyer's Boat No. 5, which arrived in Cumberland November 27, 1923. Ultimately, floods (there were two in rapid succession in 1924), the exhaustion of the coal supply in the Cumberland, Maryland area, the poor maintenance of the canal due to lack of funds and the B&O's lack of initiative to continue canal operations led to its closing.

The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal was sold to the United States government in 1938, under the stewardship of the National Park Service and the Department of the Interior. In 1961, President Dwight D. Eisenhower declared it a National Monument. Through the efforts of Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, the canal became the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park on January 8, 1972.

The canal is now a very popular hiking, biking or horseback riding trail as it winds its way along the Potomac River from Georgetown to Cumberland, Maryland, 184.5 miles away. The canal towpath is about 10-15 feet wide, completely flat and provides infinite scenic and spectacular views of the Potomac River. The Chesapeake and Ohio Canal towpath is an excellent place to experience one of the most colorful eras of our history, the mule-drawn canal-boat era of the United States.