| The Illinois & Michigan Canal originally ran for a | | | | came in. |
| distance of 96 miles from Bridgeport on the Chicago | | | | The Canal spanned sixty feet of width and was six |
| River to LaSalle-Peru on the Illinois River. The I & M | | | | feet deep, and had paths built along each of its |
| Canal opened up boat transportation from Kankakee | | | | edges in order to allow mules to be harnessed to the |
| Illinois hospital on the Great Lakes to the Mississippi | | | | barges being towed. At intervals along the route |
| River and the Gulf of Mexico. Construction was | | | | (spaced apart the distance that the mules could haul |
| begun in 1836 after the Canal Commission obtained a | | | | a barge in one day), towns were built. The I & M |
| grant of 280,000 acres of land from the national | | | | Canal had 17 locks and 4 aqueducts to equalize the |
| government. Financial backing for the project was | | | | 140-foot difference in height between Lake Michigan |
| borrowed largely from eastern U.S moneyed | | | | to the east and the Illinois River to the west. The I |
| interests, as well from English investors. When the | | | | & M Canal carried passengers as well as freight from |
| Panic of 1837 dried up funding for the project, it was | | | | its opening in 1848 until the coming of the Chicago, |
| temporarily abandoned. | | | | Rock Island, and Pacific Raiload, which ran parallel to |
| The actual building of the I & M Canal was done | | | | the Canal, in 1853. The Canal was dredged in 1871 to |
| mostly by immigrants from Ireland who had worked | | | | deepen it in order to speed the current up and to |
| previously on building the Erie Canal. Pumps were | | | | improve the disposal of sewage. Communication |
| employed to draw the water to fill the Canal, | | | | through the Chicago River was a major factor in the |
| supplemented by water from the Calumet Feeder | | | | growth of Chicago after its devastating fire in 1871. |
| Canal and the DuPage River to the south. The work | | | | Also, all the city's wastes flowed through the river to |
| was dangerous, and many workers died in accidents | | | | be dumped eventually in Lake Michigan. Inasmuch as |
| since there was no Momence Illinois healthcare. The | | | | the Lake was the main source of city drinking water, |
| Irish laborers were exploited and mistreated by the | | | | this practice thoroughly contaminated the city's |
| Canal company owners, and were generally looked | | | | water. After a great storm in 1885 caused flooding |
| down upon by the other residents. The total cost of | | | | which washed river refuse and contaminated Chicago |
| the Canal was over six million dollars. It was finally | | | | water, the alarmed Illinois legislature took action in |
| inaugurated in 1848 by Chicago Mayor James H. | | | | 1889 to construct canals and channels to turn the |
| Woodworth. This canal made possible navigating | | | | flow of the rivers from Lake Michigan rather than to |
| across the Chicago Portage, and it helped to establish | | | | it; and to divert contaminated water downstream, |
| the city of Chicago as the main transportation hub of | | | | where it would be diluted by the Des Plaines and |
| mid-America in the decades before the railroads | | | | Mississippi Rivers. |