Transcripts For CSPAN3 19th 20240703

Chair, the program committee. Dave and i thank you all for coming this evening to our lecture series. A nice turnout, a lot of different competition out there, but who can compete with this man right . Bill merchant, a great friend of mine, but of course, hes a great historian and hes really wheel and bringing forth the true history of a great story known as the delaware and hudson canal. So tonight, bill will give you a chock full of new information, great insights and wonderment bill merchant everyone. Thank you very much for coming this evening. Im the Deputy Director for collections historian and here at the dean Canal Historical Society and im the chair or president of the delaware and hudson transportation heritage council. Now that ive gotten over the most difficult part of the talk, im really delighted to do this particular presentation. I have never done it here for the Canal Society. My general history of the dredge. Im working on a book on the topic and itll probably be called the dutch canal 19th century engine of prosperity, because indeed it was. This is a story thats important to all americans. So im really delighted with our new museum and visitor center. Our tv are very active Youtube Channel and our social media. Were getting this story out to more of the world. More americans should know this story. And ill give you a few reasons why, as we. But before i get into my program we recognize that were guests in the original homeland of the lenape and muncie peoples. We extend our respect and gratitude to the many Indigenous Peoples who call this land home. Its long past time that we start to recognize injustices. Our past, we historians context. By my lights, this story begins with a war 1812 at the war of 1812. At this point in time, first you have to realize america was just basically all the states east of the appalachian mountains. The appalachian were a huge barrier to settlement, and a lot of the 19th century history of our country is really about getting over the mountains and and all of that, if you will, war of 1812, we we had an energy crisis. We were buying our coal from brits we had because everything east of the appalachians had been clear cut. We didnt have enough wood for fuel as well as building for make barrel making and all the other industries that needed wood it was cheaper at this point in time to ship coal across the Atlantic Ocean than by land in. We didnt have transportation infrastructure. We by and large had one way waterways. We had native american trails, we had roads were actually better in the winter, frozen than they were during the wet, muddy seasons. We had a lot of coal in virginia, but it was there was no affordable way to get it to market canals in general. In the era people say it was the era of canal fever, the 19th century here in america in particular, canals have been around. I mean, Leonardo Da Vinci invents the miter and about 1500 england by this point in time had really developed canals much more than we did. In fact, a lot of our canal engineers would go to england and study, walk around and ask questions, but but but. The danish canal was one of many, many canals that were built in the 19th century as railroads ascended up. So other thing that happened in the war of 1812, there were a of dry goods merchants by the name of Morris William wirtz, the two gentlemen right here. There was actually four work brothers, but these three are the most important to our story. Morris and william. There were good quakers of of swiss extraction, and they got a contract from the Us Government to supply uniforms to the to, the war effort. The Us Government this point in time had more land than money. Some things never change, right . As, as a consequence. Instead of getting paid in cash for these that the uniforms supplies they were given coal bearing land in northeastern pennsylvania northeastern pennsylvania has quarters of all the worlds anthracite coal. An astounding statistic. And throughout the 19th century, they just, i believe, canals that ultimately are built to to bring this resource to market it. Basically, this coal source fuels the Industrial Revolution in america really makes america as we know it possible. The erie canal was really the one that led them all and so, as i said, we didnt have schools of Civil Engineering yet. West point opens in 1808. But its really about military engineering. Rensselaer opens in 1823 or 1824. Later, rensselaer polytechnic institute, in fact, the first Civil Engineering degree in america is not given until the 1840s either by rpi or union. They both claim the credit. Im sure that somebody will will correct on this at some point. So a lot of the brain trust learned on the job and the erie canal was really of really the training ground. And so weve got john jervis, Benjamin Wright, james mcentee, and these names will come up again were Benjamin Wright was the chief engineer of the of the eventually the chief the chief engineer originally he was the engineer for one quarter of the era. But by the time they done he was the of the entire thing. As such, hes now sought after john jervis was a farm boy that started learn engineering on the erie canal, as did james mcentee. James mcentee has a very career and you folks that are kingston area probably know its a famous kingston area name and jervis becomes one of the celebrate engineers in american history. All these people are just theyre not going to college are learning on the job american know chief engineer benjamin right i like to say anybody digging a ditch hired this guy. So he doesnt even do the survey. Its a beautiful 1824 map of the canal route that that was produced. Basically, why was it produced . Because benjamin, right after the survey was done, discovery told them that it was going to take about 1. 5 million to build this. Now, thats a lot of money today, but the buying power today of 1. 5 million is 30 to 40 million, depending on who you talk to. So a Staggering Amount of money. And so in these early days, we dont have the stock market yet. The new york stock exchanges exist in some form or other in the late 18th century, but they dont have their force Board Meeting until 1823 or 24. The tontine house, a wall street in new york city. Coffee houses in this era were places where people who had money to invest find investment opportunities. So the day each company on january 7th, 1825, they overstepped over subscribed their they raised basically one and a half Million Dollars by 2 00 in the afternoon. It was a cold january day in the lower has it that one of the problems was anthracite took a little bit of knowhow to burn blacksmiths love the play love the stuff they were using it. Jesse fell on a narrow nail factory. They were using it in the philadelphia area, but the general public had problems with it. Their stories of people getting a load of this wonderful shiny black rocks in frustration when they couldnt burn it lined the street, which i have to say probably looked kind of nice right. But so one of the things they did is they proved you can burn anthracite coal. And this is something on they actually sold special. We have in our museum a replica of one of the early coal coal burning grates. They get all that money in one pipe. They got 5 down, but with 75,000, they start digging the drake canal. I love this quote, irishman for who else would dig and delve and drudge and do Domestic Work and, make canals, roads and exercise great of internal improvement. Irishman and in fact, the dutch canal could not have been constructed without immigrant labor. And throughout its history it will rely relies on peoples. But the building of it in particular was all irishman. And this is this is Charles Dickens when hes touring america after the canal is up and running by 1842, the canals are pretty successful. Enterprise. And what did they build. This is a this is a map of the danish canal. It was 108 miles long. It had 108 locks, 20 aqueducts, 168 bridges, 84 waist wires, 24 guard locks, 37 named basins, and 76 unnamed basins, basically accidents of topography, of canals were built in river valleys. So you can see the canal started at honesdale actually, it was the forks of debris. But philippon, their first president , so they they had a they named many places after luminaries. So the forks of debris quickly gets named for their first president. Philippon then it followed the lack of wax from river to the confluence of the lack of wax. And then the delaware cross, theyre on a rope ferry. And later on a very famous aqueduct followed the Delaware River at port jervis, named for john jervis, the second chief engineer. He comes over with Benjamin Wright, works as assistant engineer and takes over when wright gets too busy and takes his paycheck and runs it, then follows the never seen river. The bascule, the sandburg creek, the round joins it and ellen bill and it winds up in the city of kingston at eddie ville and round out in kingston still 80 miles from its intended market in new york city. But this was topography is king the showing of mountains which were along the right hand side of this line were too big a barrier at this point in time. They dont get tunnel for another or 60 years. But this is this is what Benjamin White suggested, how they build it . This is how it was built that he got it right and it ran a little more money. But but he pretty well got it got it got it right the first time and this is just a wonderful period painting gives you an idea of what the what the damage looked like back in the day of that bridge is interesting because believe it or not, thats Covered Bridge. So wouldnt trust bridges would last maybe 15 years. But if you cover the trusses the last 50 to 60 years so we all think that they were covering it for us. But in fact, on these bridges, its called a pony truss Covered Bridge. The historian ron knapp, whos done a couple of public works on Covered Bridges, taught me about these Covered Bridges. And between weve now uncovered, i think its 23 Covered Bridges on the canal that we can prove unknown the society for the Covered Bridge into my spare time. Were going to go write an article in, let him know about it. But theres an awful lot of work to do. Fortunately, a lot of fun. Lets see if we can get you to move. And heres just to give you an idea of this is alan villa in pictures. I love this picture because its the best, best image of the kind locks they built. So they they got two prices cut. Stonemason and youll see those out on our five block walk. These locks that we see here were built in the final enlargement of 1850. Theyre all cut. Stone thats more expensive. These are what, we call composite locks in this image can really see the white lining that these that these locks so theyre just dry large stone. So if you go to a one of these locks today, youre just going to see dry laid stone. You wont see sometimes youll see a little bit of metal. One or two still have some of the wood, but it was cheaper to build them with a white oak lining. But this meant that they had to be repaired every ten years or so. White oak is water resistant, but its resistant not waterproof. The bolts were also made of white oak and they also had a similar. They only between five and ten years. Ill talk about that a little more in the talk. Im just going to. The dna had a another problem that they had to deal with to get their coal to market. I told you that honesdale is where they started the canal, but the coal was 70 miles and 850 foot up and back within the town of carbondale. I love how they name places back then, right . Carbondale. Carbondale was just nothing. There was a farmer too, when the wirtz were given the land around there. They actually went around and they had somebody help buy more land. They were, they really got into this, but they had to get up over 850 foot of the lucic mountains. Theres no water there. Thats an awful these these locks had about ten foot of lift so you do the a little not enough water in a mountain john jervis designs the very first Gravity Railroad it was called a Gravity Railroad because they use the all the cars were connected and they used the weight of the laden cars descending to pull up the cars on the other end. And it had i think it was five planes. So there was a lot of up and down, but it worked quite successfully and in very early era. Now you see this this is a very late picture. The original one was much more like the models in our museum have like stringers with half inch by two inch iron plating on of it. The dredge company, theyre a company of firsts. They theyre an american company. They really they embraced new technologies at every turn. They won the first Steam Locomotive in the hemisphere, the stockbridge line, albeit for two days. And heres something that i think it finally got in a book. Nobodys able to say. We know that it wound up too heavy for the tracks. John jervis designed the railroad to carry five tons. So thats it. So four tons of coal in each car. And the cars were about a ton. The locomotive with the water had to be five tons. It gets honesdale. Its seven tons. I like to say the star bridge lane was five tons in stockbridge, england where it was built, but it was seven tons in honesdale. This is because of the imperial system and ive done the math. The measurements have changed, but in this era, five imperial tons were more or less seven american tons. So it was an honest. And weve had these problems with, the space program, the Hubble Space Telescope went up in the air with something that was made to metric or vice versa. They had to send a whole Space Shuttle up to repair one of the mars landers had the wrong distance, its engine shut off before it landed. So it like a simple mistake. But in fact this is this is my best guess as a historian we speculate good historians will tell you when theyre speculating this is my speculate and ive read an awful lot of other reasons why none of them make as much sense as this one does to me. Of course, we all like our own ideas right . So the canal, you know, these immigrant workers get out there, they build it in basically three years. In fact, a stretch. Port jervis to randolph was operational in 1827. Their training are learned how to run a canal. But it was more or less a budget and it was it started to move their coal. The story so involved when you try to do an hour long, you have to pick and choose so many of the people who built canal went on to work at i love john johnston. John johnston was a was a youngster and remembers the surveying crews camping on his familys property. He grows up to become a surveyor, which means he becomes a lawyer. In early american history, people who wrote surveys, then had to defend them. So they learned law once again. We didnt have law schools yet. Harvard law was an open yet harvard was. Although maybe you know, i have to look into that now. But john johnston, he grows up. He in pond eddy on the Delaware River his entire life. And then he writes his reminiscence when hes in his eighties, his wife passes. Hes got nothing to do. Its a wonderful read. You can buy it at the mini valley society. He doesnt pull any punches. You know how he feels. But its really a potent source. And i love this particular quote. The mass were composed of the vulgar and debased of ages from 10 to 60 of the various kinds of nationalities irish, dutch, africans, americans and others, all of the most lewd, vulgar and depraved and honesty compels the that the most objectionable features were filed amongst the americans. Some things never change, by the way, when he says dutch he much, most, most assuredly deutsch means german. Although we do have an oral history of one dutchman who who was a lot tender in his descendants, emailed us the story. Were collecting oral histories at times. Were still filling out the story that apparently he hated catholics. And i scratch my head, given the preponderance of irishmen, the canal. And there were up to 5000 canadian plying their trade and hes turning away everybody. They got the last laugh. The family is now catholic. But also a kids, children of child labor. I do a whole presentation on child labor. And in fact, you grew up young in this era. We most often see this is young, young man. Hes a hoagie, a buell driver, hoagie. The two phrases he would use the most whole for stop guy for go that the mules were the preferred animal. They used horses as well, but mules were the preferred animal for them. The mule a little side sideline. The mule was actually popularized in america under George Washington when he was president the president. The king of spain gives them to donkey studs and he using using them on his farm. Eventually, by the 19th century. This is the animal you wanted, worked longer and harder and less speed. They were they were less flighty than horses. So they were just a better investment. And they became the preferred draft animal throughout that era. They also had they were hiring immigrants continuously. They first started mining their coal and they got surface. Thats fine. But eventually you got to dig into the ground. And that takes specialized knowledge. They assiduously they would put ads in the papers and get workmen from from scotland, ireland, the United Kingdom and wales, the town of carbondale to this day has a really large proportion of people descended from the that came because they had the knowledge of how to how to extract this this coal and then in an International Enterprise in a sign you know immigration at this point in time that we none of this would have happened without immigrants. You know, we are a nation of immigrants and history just teaches us how important they are to us. The teenage company wanted put their boats. They want they dont you know, every you have to handle coal then youre going to pay somebody its going to cost you money. Right their plan was to put their boats on the hudson the earliest were 70 foot long, nine foot wide, carried 30 tons of coal. They just werent. Now, they could not go out onto the hudson. The hudsons a tidal estuary. You need a bigger boat. Eventually, when they do their final enlargement, they get bigger boats and even then full riverboats were 200 more and had gunnels that were a foot and a half higher because thats what you needed in the end, they werent successful because the canal could buy whatever boat they wanted and the cheapest boats couldnt go on the hudson. They made more money, stayed on the canal. Its its one of the rare things where the lowest guys on the other, you know, in the feet, if you will, actually had a little bit of agency. They bought the so in the midst of season section boats made for the morris canal were 800. Everybody bought those a regular scow at this point in time 1200 dollars and a full riverboat 1400 dollars youre making to 100 a year. So paying off a boat, the Canal Company was selling it to you and taking it was around 20 a trip. The canal boats were numbered. The Canal Company kept track. Once you bought the boat, you named it so we can we know that when you see a name boat that that was somebody that had taken good care of their boat. Were getting really good years out of it because they werent getting their boats of the hudson in 1844. The Canal Companies starting to enlarge. They had kind of rough start, a rocky start if you want to be punny because they were mining surface and it got a Bad Reputation it took them a while to get up and running by the forties they started launching that canal first by deepening it, but they also hired mackenzie. So james works as an engineer in the area, he comes to kingston, he does all sorts of stuff. He founds the mansion house, he owns it twice. He develops Chestnut Street for you people who know about kingston. But he also he had a lot of side hustles. They hire him to build island dock. Island dock was basically a sandbar that juts into the round out creek. They cut a cut a strip and made an island out of it. They were putting pilings down 40 and 50 foot and 1844 to support the buildings. There were loading keys throughout it. They crossed it. You can see to this day when you go to round out, you can see the very perfectly width strip nature goes in a Straight Line and you can see still the bulkheads, the wood, some of it probably from the 19th century because it stays underwater. And that gives you a grip. The picture is great because you see all of that coal at their peak. They move in 1872, almost a million and a half tons of coal on their. This little that the thing on the left ill read it out here the coal shovel was worked in gangs of three three men to a boat and shovel coal into buckets, transferring cargoes from canal boats, probably due to the broken time awaiting assignments they acquired occupational name of loafers and busy times. 50 to 60 gangs of loafers were employed it like a pejorative, you know, loafers but this is what they were trying to avoid. They were never completely successful. But you will see then they they they picked up and dusted themselves off and they they did something else. A little sidelight we talk about marginalized immediately after the canal opens. Theres a great newspaper article that the very first load of coal unloaded tate was a loaded by three men, all named john and the guy in charge was also named john. The ubiquity of the name john, the loafers were an irishman, a german and a colored a person of color. We would say today this is particularly noteworthy because this is jim, this is virtually the only image of a black teenage canal worker where we have his name and we only im going to say 20 names out of a database of almost 2000 names. Ive only got 20. I can definitively say were people of color. But we can tell from the historic record they worked for less money. And so they would you know, they would get the. On my long bucket list of things to do im told that theres jacksons his descendants in round out today and ive got to reach out to them in my spare time and see what they know about him the Canal Company were embraces of technology of their Gravity Railroad used iron chain. It kept breaking so they had to switch to hemp rope. Hemp rope, at least is going to show you when its going to go. The very first year they switch, its a 4,000 line item on their on their on their annual report. Thats a lot of money at that point in time though those steam were in the same range. An awful lot of money. John roebling is a german immigrant who moved to move pennsylvania. Hes going to be a sheep farmer. I always laugh at this because theres nothing in his life. He studied surveying in mulhouse and nothing his life that hed become a sheep farmer. In fact, he was a horrible sheep farmer then. I have a problem with that because how hard is it to farm sheep now . At any rate, he fails at it. He had heard about the idea of making rope out of wire when he was in europe. So he starts doing it. Hes got to do something and he creates a wire walk eventually. John roebling is one of the richest men in america. Really not. Not because of his other technology. Because of the wire rope business. I contend he could develop the Suspension Technology because he had the money. So his very first buyers of wire rope were Gravity Railroads, not the ditch, but another one. And he actually gave it to them on spec, but it was successful and in 1844, Canal Company imagine what they what they must saving because they closed down on weekends they would send crews out to take the hemp rope down every saturday and put it back out a mondays must have been tremendously expensive. So wire rope made a big difference. Theres a piece of it thats on permanent loan from the Rolling Museum in our museum i didnt know until we got it. Its got an oiled hemp center and thats to keep the wire rope flexible. Once he was on their radar in their final enlargement, he constructs for suspension aqueducts. There were only ever five suspension aqueducts in america. John roebling built them all. The first one was in pittsburgh, replacing one that was destroyed in a fresh. But he builds these for one is now its still extant its over the delaware its a National Park site and you can drive it and see it today. The other three were one was over the lack of jackson river. One was over the Never Sink River and one was right here in high falls. The Canal Society recently, the 1850 Collectors Office. Im pointing over because its about a thousand foot over there, and we now own everything out to the aqueduct abutment and well be making our National Historic landmark five locks walk into a six locks walk in the next couple of years. Because its really wonderful thing to see there. Fascinating. The technology is fascinating. They undertake a final enlargement. This is how a successful they are. Theres other extenuating circumstances that are too much to ill get way into the weeds we if i get into it but now they go to go up to 15 foot wide 92 foot long. The canal is between 32 and 50 foot wide. The boats are now a. 14 and a half foot wide a 91 foot long and eventually carry 130 tons of coal. And this is what the locks we see here in high falls in all of the locks. So if you go out so we have ftv, our Youtube Channel and my and seems to be popular with other people whereas our historian i go out into the into the field and show you whats in the ground and explain whats there. Theres over 411 extant features that will now be listed on the National Register as a landmark. We are in the middle of updating it. Im working with the crews of doing a lot of the the history end it but couldnt be more excited were going to really protect as much as we can. Its unfortunate that our National Landmark registration doesnt as much as i wish it would. Theres a National Movement to start people. And heres just another. I love to mix up the period photos with these color photos and what it looks like. You know, in that latter era, all of our photograph saw in the post enlargement era photographys developed in the 1840s really. But its not really till the civil war. So most of our images its very hard. Recently a visitor took us to task for not having the dates on our postcards. Id love to if had the dates, but id be speculating. You know, i could tell you within 40 years. Yeah. We might just as well. I just love this. But here, here, the delaware and hudson canal and prosperous times it employs nearly 2000 boatmen foreigners and who with rare exception follow the canal life. This is an 1878 at its peak. This is now in its decline, not the company, because the Canal Company was a coal company. Theyre building and buying railroads by 1872, which is the year that they moved the most coal in their canal they owned or control railways between new york city and montreal. So theyre really as much a railroad as they are a Canal Company at that point. So at its peak, it employed they had a thousand coal boats. So thats 3000 people. And then it was about another 300 boats that did other industries. And they were very and ill get into that in a second. The other industries that were able to to prosper because they had this means of inexpensive transportation. They innovators here we see a this has been hendricks at sam taylors lock no longer extant this would be luck im going to get it wrong now right. Like 32, i think. Thanks, dave. A lot like 32 everybody thinks is a sam taylor but weve got documents that say sam didnt have a beard, but hes sitting in the gear house to lock tenders. They were making about 30 bucks a week. This is better paid to be in a canal or they convert all of their locks to a single tender, an early source of primary source, some Court Testimony tells us one of the first locks was here in high falls. The building we are in today was purchased by the Canal Company in 1850 as offices is so i speculate that its this lock right here if youve got new and youve got an office, youre going to try it nearby, arent you . But again, this is speculation. You know, henry, Edward Lamson henry of member of the national wonderful. He formed the crags more. Arts colony, and he painted a lot of canal scenes. Some of them get mistaken for the erie canal. And i posit he he didnt mind because that just widened the audience for his for his first his work. And well see another one of his images thats in a pbs on the erie. But i can tell you definitively it was ellisville. His wife tells us we have we have proof. So the Canal Company, as i said, 1872, is kind of their peak in that era. They were theyre cutting you about a dollar ton. So forever 130 tons that you got from honesdale to to to run out to island dock. Youve got 130. And then they take 20 out for the boat. But that would add up. You could do 16, even 18 trips in a season. So do the math. Its part of the reason why they werent successful getting the canals to go out. Not only were the boats more expensive, but they even tell you two days minimum to, new york city and back. They didnt pay you as much as that that could be another whole trip you so i think they paid 28 so youd make 28 bucks when those days, uh, you know, five of those. And thats another trip it took about ten, ten days round trip. No, it was better for them to stay on the boat and not go out on the hudson, but this is this is interesting. This is a of some of these sent us the relation florence and Philip Degroot and this is an image at the lac wax and aqueduct. This is one of the four suspension aqueducts built before 1850. This is fascinating because theres a famous photo. See it . Our museum of the little freddie and some books say its the delaware. Some say its a lack of access. And its definitely lack of jackson. But ive identified i, i think its eight photos now all taken at this spot so an enterprising photographer possibly Little Pencil his building with his name on is still in holly, pennsylvania possibly just set up there on slow days and would take a picture. You and your family, the little side hustle on his part. But its wonderful because we have all these great but here we know in the 1870s they were giving you a dollar a ton probably pressure from the railroads even their old railroads it drops to 60 0. 60 a ton, a 40 drop a little more if you do the math. And yet they say they turned away hundreds of workers were still people who wanted this work. Its my contention this is when we start to see images like this family groups. Theres mom at the tiller dad at the front of the boat. You needed somebody at the front of the boat. You needed somebody steering. You didnt necessarily need a mule driver. If your mules listen to you. But very often there were children. And this is, in fact, our son, ralph. Theres a great story that came with this image, little ralph, that the team scared by a Railroad Whistle when took off down the towpath, little ralph held on and he he gets the team. His parents give 0. 04 and a really great thing. The guy that sent it to me, he said, you got a nickel and then he sent the families reminiscent in. And now its 0. 04, you know, 0. 04 in 1895 was real, especially for for for a youngster like this. You know. But well see an awful lot of these images in our collections. Weve got a lot of family groups on the boats, the dna, Gravity Railroad. Um, it was really tough to move coal. They rejigger it. I think its five times they make it more and more efficient. Originally, a single track with sidings and they double track it and by the way, it used gravity, but it also used water power, fuel power and steam power. In fact, the storage lion steam engine was re reused in one of the planes. But by 1860, the teenage Canal Company starts offering regular passenger. This is the company thats always looking for ways to make money. And so here, as i zoom and that was a postcard image, someday im going do a whole presentation on things that people made stereo cards and postcards. Of course. Its amazing. Theres this weirdest things, right but this this. I zoomed in so you could see these just people on passenger trains far view was the of the Music Mountains this is another one of those gee i wonder where they got name from you know far view its a prison today most of the gravity is gone as weve done the survey for the National Register for view becomes a really popular sunday and weekend destination for Church Groups and the like. On the right is a as a tintype thats in our collections on the back it says far view 1893. So these women their sunday finery had had a tintype taken of your the polaroid of its day i suppose, although i dont think they were quite that quick right. But i love this one. On the left blew the sunshine. Professor Randolph Perry was scheduled to ascend in a balloon and the jump out with a parachute. Right. It didnt end up happening. Well, it didnt end happening that day at fairview. He does it from carbondale later in the week, i guess the next week. But it becomes a side hustle. Theyve got a railroad that goes past lake george. So they put out these these things. They, you know, theyre going to go in their coal company, remember, but theyve always got their look out for other ways to to to give value to their shareholders. So these are two wonderful pieces in our collections that that weve managed to collect in the last couple of years. The actual depot is now a public building at lake george on the southern end. Its a its a public building. Its still extant. The lake george village, i was there about a year ago, as late as 1932. The Canal Company operated three steamboats. If anybodys to lake george. And due to the minnehaha the morgan the mohican were various names the Canal Company operated those at this point theyre a railroad this is the post canal area. But once theyre always doing new things, they embraced the telegraph from from the start. We have a correspondence journal by the chief engineer 1849. Hes just saying send it by telegraph. They actually contribute at 300 for one of the first telegraph lines in 1849, from buffalo, new york to new york city, coincidentally passed through carbondale. And, you know, it doesnt sound like much 300. But again, in that era that was stepping up, that was that was 5,000 or thereabouts maybe, you know, that was a significant 1862. They actually run telegraph lines on their entire run. And these are public. We earlier we had an oral history that said they werent public. That was only in the 20th century originally. These were public telegraph offices another way for them to make money. We recently the Canal Society acquired a Collectors Office that then turned into a telegraph office. Its an all original shape, but we will restoring it in the next couple of years. Its possibly the oldest extant telegraph office in america. So these guys are again, american innovators, really an important american story. Remember, they they couldnt get those darn canals to take their boats to new york city right. So what do they do . They invest in new technology. Theyre using a steam shovel in honesdale in 1872. I didnt know they had shovels in 1872 until i read that they make the cover of the Scientific American touting their very innovative coal handling technology chase on loaders, dodge elevators and. I keep meaning to chase down whether that dodge went on to make cars. Theres another research chore. Heres another steel engraving from that. Its also fascinating that photography still isnt in magazines. Theyre still using these steel engravings that its too expensive. Its not till the early 20th century, the left has an image. A lot of the images youll see everybody has. This is an image thats in collections. Its getting out there now. But there is one of those one of those unloading machines on the one side. And theres a theres a sloop on the other side there. This is probably 1890. Sarah, photograph again, i speculate because its not dated this is that image i said everybody says its the erie i put this up on facebook of the historian who i really respect, you know, said, oh, no, no, thats here. I saw it on pbs. I can say definitively because the catalog raisonne for e. L. Henry has henrys at this point saying this was painted ellisville. Now myself ive seen so many pictures of the teenage canal i know is helen bill but again e. L. Probably didnt care right we have we have a couple copies. This one one is on display in our tavern room and we have a modern one thats in one of the bathrooms. So theyre a coal company, but theyre also packer boats. There are no photographs of packer boats. And this is because the railroads captured that traffic before photography develops enough. But we know from the historic record packer boats were common famously orange packet burned to the to the waterline and i think it was 1850 and anvil so it also one source says it was the way that migrants into pennsylvania it was the cheapest way to get down there. So once again they would accommodate other. And one of the Major Industries that the canal really helped foster is rossendale cement youll read theres theres a sign i want to take down. I shouldnt be saying this. Theres a theres an erroneous historic marker here in town. We can say definitively, ive a lot of research on this rossendale cement was discovered by a geologist hired the dean h company. The earliest primary source we have is their annual report. A similar thing had happened on the erie. A guy by the name of canvas white had discovered limestone. He figures out how to make natural cement out of it. He had been to england studying canals and ipads. The process you know, its hard to defend a process, patent it. Everybody ripped them off. But the state of new york him 10,000 the dna was going to get their cement from the erie but they were smart. They had a geologist travel with them and they hit no, not paydirt, but diplomatic limestone. And this this is the initial. So youll see in this area many, many cement kilns. It was a Huge Industry starting here. But cement, id like to point out as a proud high was discovered here in high falls people by the second half of the 19th century, more than half of all of north america cement is this product, in fact, natural cement is responsible for the canal operating until 1819 excuse me, 1917. Theres a thing with historians numbers. We always mix them up where you had cement, you had coopers, the art of cooperage fascinates me. Cooper is basically making a round wooden box, so coopers didnt just make barrels. They made versions for butter and produce and products. They made wash buckets, they made sap. No town was without a without a cooper, no ship. A discovery went out. If youre going to go whaling for instance there was coopers all the materials to make barrels on board cooper in a Huge Industry thats completely out also noteworthy in this image is look at those young men in this area youre going to see and. We know historically there are stories of mule drivers starting at seven and eight on the dredge canal, working their way up by ten or 11. Theyre the bauman and 15 year old captains with youngsters under them. I make the argument my presentation on child labor. You got to start wondering whats really a child these these are theyre doing mens work. Theyre definitely in fact america does not pass child labor laws until 1938. And i speculate that the only reason they did that was because all the men were out of work. But i got to chase that one down. But its an interest. But can you imagine . We did not. We would employ children regularly until that time. I like to say childhood. This is a 20th century invention, unless youre rich. But otherwise families had large, large numbers of children for any number of reasons, not the least of which childhood mortality was high. And you need needed workers. You worked. Why do we go to school in the winter . People . Because that was the only time you had off, basically, especially farmers and the like. Bluestone is a naturally occurring sandstone and that was very popular in the 19th century for curbing because its not slippery when wet, it also does come in green and red varieties. But the blue, the blue color was the most prized. There was many. Theres quarries down on the Delaware River that i theres no way they would have ever had a market for it if the canal did go past there, a wonderful material gets supplanted by portland cement, as does natural cement. The early 20th century, those locals. This is an image of the black and white. On the left is the randolph waterfront. And there you can see wilbur, which is a town about a mile before before round out proper was the center and on the right is that man started building still extant and a National Historic landmark itself was fitchs and that was the largest bluestone dealer in america there are stories of rich new yorkers getting a 10,000 slab of bluestone and having it shipped down to new york on the canal and on canal boats and and use it. It was a way to off at that point. But you know imagine the 10,000 stone then had to be it was it was a pretty big one. You know, the local showing of conglomerate is a favored building material. We think that the John Roebling specified it for the what do you call the pyramids for the structures that carried all the way, the suspension. Structures. But it also made great millstones. Were told that they rivaled the french, who apparently made the best millstones right here in the saint joseph in an ville about oh, im going to say three miles down the canal from. Here was a was the stone cutting center. If you drive there today, youll see tailings everywhere, see signs of it. There was on the side of the road theres unfinished planks. Once again i want to point out we the names of all these gentlemen in our archives. But look at top of the one on the right there. How old is both years. But america was different place in this time. And i dont know. We appreciate it. You know, remember i told you boats only lasted 5 to 10 years. Boatbuilding huge. Ive got 100 names now on a database of. Either firms or workers who built boats. There were dry docks all along the canal. Both to repair boats and to build them. Theres a wonderful image. Im pretty sure this is phillips port and this is the heres the boat building crew. Theres all the material and theyre all on their boat for the photo op op. And here is the boothroyd dry dock in marketing new york just over the the Ulster County border off route 209. Its now a Historic Site administered by Sullivan County, and they do a pretty nice job. Theyve got a small Little Museum theyre working on there. But you can see remains of this dry dock. Theres a lock there, theres the remains of a grocery by the boothroyds houses. There. And theyve got a beautiful watered stretch. Nothing, nothing, says canal more to me than an actual stretch that still has water in it right. And theyve got a few of them right out on that. In an era that consistently maintained the water canals to this day, im told are used in england to carry ceramic because theres less breakage. The louisville glassworks was a Glass Company in connecticut that decided to come to new york for any number of reasons they wanted to buy a round out one that was to farm. So when the dredge terminated, an entire town built up by 1855, half its population was immigrants. Germans and irishmen brought to either work on the canal or in these industries. Were talking about the old mill glassworks. Too expensive. They just go down the they go to ellen mill and, they open up a glasswork they bring sand in the jersey shore, up the atlantic up the atlantic coast. They make glass. In the 1880s, it employs 800 men. This has got to be the the biggest employer in in ellisville at that point in time. And it lasted about a maybe 25 years. Theres almost nothing left, unfortunately. Towns the canal tended to get destroyed more often than the out in the country. Theres an awful lot of the canal still there as. I say 411 extant features, raw hides were shipped from south america in the caribbean. So you think the argentine, the pampas, the cowboys. All right. I guess they didnt have the right trees to stand down there because they would ship the rawhide up the atlantic up the hudson river. Of course, they go to tanners mill, but they also ship them out into the ditch. 1 19 century history says that the union marched on Sullivan County leather. In fact, the dean each had its its best year. It paid 30 of the stock in 1863. And i speculate that could be due and ill ill get to the bottom it someday that could be due to the extra traffic like supplying to the union army. But they made the best sole leather with the with the hammocks. We in the era but Sullivan County in particular south of here had tons of tanneries a big industry, a big employment for a for a lot of the the local folk but towards the end of here is 1895 of boating is very poor and the canal many little girls are seen driving the teams their service being much more obtained. The middle boys that painting you see there is it was this institutions of logo for the longest time thats e. L henrys on the towpath and this shows a girl i believe shes picking petals from a flower with a mule team ive never seen those masks you see on the mules. Note the steers on the front of the boat very famous yellow henry painting, a magnificent painter. But whats even more fascinating. Last year we discovered so bay at pearl, the curator of the crags free library. They were given 130 black and white glass negatives by lee grand botsford. Now we have three of lee grans paintings on display here in, our museum. The story is lee grand would work for ireland. He taught lee grant how to paint lee grants more of a folk artist. But but talent in his own right. But what you see there on the left is a high quality photograph on the towpath with the color taken on the right is the photograph when saw this, i said that this has to be a picture of the painting. This image, the paper envelope says canal scene not on the towpath. So we put them side by side. And if you look at this, its clear that that photograph is is an actual photograph. This was until recently the only image of a girl mule driver on the drainage canal. Women are the most marginalized. Women got the vote. 50 years after black men right. The only image were hundreds, if not thousands. Remember said family groups. That meant that whatever the sex of the child was, they were mule driver. We have great video. Were working on. Weve got the soundtrack up. We have a girl hoagy silhouette in front of our museum. We were lucky enough to find the name of a woman and a recording of her, which was immensely satisfying. And were hoping for a picture. Were hoping for a picture. So until recently this was the only image of a girl mule driver. But courtney conti, our assistant of and our video editor for dna tv, we were working the ellisville library. Were doing a video project them about stone here high falls again. Ill try not to do grass, but were looking through there binder is of photographs and courtney picks this out and i blew it up there on the right we now have two images of girl girl hoagies. So, you know, this research is were trying to tell the stories of these people and were really its immensely satisfying. And im sure for courtney, she was delighted, immensely satisfying. Try and add to this history and particularly this history of people that history has ignored. I think we as cultural institutions have real obligation. Its not being woke. You know, talking about enslavement isnt alternative. Race. Its trying to tell the whole story. And i think we have an obligation to our audience ourselves, to history, to try and tell the whole story. But all things must come to an end. By 1898, they only make them enough money. The railroads are doing fine. Theyre still selling plenty of coal, but they finally decide its time to give up the canal. And they they they sell it. A guy by the name of samuel crocodile buys most of he operates it ultimately a section of it operates from just east of here to tidewater. Until 1917. A lot of the books have that wrong, but we in our archives, we can definitively now through our research and its my speculation that our entry into world war one, all of a sudden all the workers left and that that put the cabot but portland was already kind of it was the going thing it set quicker, liked it better. One source recently told me, you can actually demolish portland cement, which could be important to you. Believe me, i can tell you from personal experience you cannot do to rosendale cement that stuff tough. It was a hydraulic cemented set underwater, which is how it got to. But the dredge heres the heres the eponymous locomotive the dredge they continued selling coal throughout the 20th century by midcentury, oil finally supplants coal. They become a freight line. They go bankrupt. In 1990. But then the name is still bought out by a Canadian Pacific railway. I believe still run trains under the dutch name. But its the company really. It had a great run from 1825 to 1990. Thats pretty good. And i dont think they lost money hardly at all. Some sources in the 19th century it was one of the wealthiest corporations as well know. But as i said, all good things must come to an end and that includes this presentation. So i thank you very much for listening to me. And at this point, if anybody questions, youll wait second and courtney will bring your mic and you can ask them. Jerry but thank you. Hey, bill, with the Gravity Railroad, does that mean that the barges, the ships that started out with coal would come to the railroad and have to unload their coal onto the railroad. Then after it got over the mountain, have to reload the coal back on more barges. They loaded the coal cars in carbondale. They went up and over when. They got to honesdale. They worked smart. Now the thing is, the gravity could operate the canal operated from april till november and then a day stop we had much more severe winters then, but so they would actually get big piles of coal. They collect during the winter. So what they would do is they use weve got an image the in the museum theyd use troughs, theyd use gravity and the cars some of them actually tipped into the boats. So honesdale had a huge depot. Most of its theres a wall, you cant see it. But theres some great images. They they would dump as much as possible the coal directly from the cars into the boats and. Eventually, as i say, 1872, they started using steam shovel, you know, and thats why the Canal Company from the start a great quote probably from benjamin in an early unpublished history that we have our archives where its hes saying, oh, the boats will go out on the hudson. Well, that never happened. This is 1825. By 1850, weve got letters from the chief engineer, hes talking about five different pattern boats. Every time he says, well, these be able to go out on the hudson. Clearly it was important to them to save the manpower. As i explained the, canal had a little bit of agency. They bought the cheap boats they couldnt go out on the hudson. Yeah they tried to not handle i mean they really not want to offload at island dock but as you saw in the presentation when that when that wasnt successful, just dust themselves off, figure out another way and by the tail end of the the era, they just they they bought machinery. They invested in machinery, you know, so any other questions questions . I hope that means that i covered it. So thoroughly, although i although i have to say i left out lots, i promise you. But one second, peter. And could you just talk a little bit more about role of the africanamerican workers on the canal . I mean, so it was mostly irish and german workers. What the role of the african workers . So i did some research, the Community Foundation. Im going to get this wrong. Theres a very specific way im supposed to say this, but suffice it to say the Community Found theyll never see this the Community Foundations of gave me a stipend to direct research into the marginalized populations and it was fascinating. I would have done this anyways, but having somebody focus really helped me out. I can find no evidence of people of color digging the canal now down south. Enslavers would rent their enslaved to build canals. Thats well documented at this point in time new york has been muted its its enslaved. But what i think happened its well documented the irish would fight with anybody including other irish to keep the work amongst themselves. And so i think there was a very small africanamerican presence, hardly noticeable, not on the that i found thus far. I continually doing research i may find more, but i can say definitively remember reference that article that said the first boatload of coal was unloaded. One of those workers was a black worker. There is other newspaper i found to talk about men that worked on the canal since. It was discovered that they literally said, i always got a kick out of discovered. Okay, so they and we do know one of the top captains one season was a person of color theres a great source that ive dug into. Ive read through it the first time im about to turn around to do it again. Its 5000 pages of Court Testimony. From 58 to 60 of the dna. Each one. But the other party never paid. So id like to say historians and their audiences are the only beneficiaries. But in there i learned the story of captain james rose. James rose. So peter appel was the sheriff for rochester, new york, not the one on the erie, but the little town just south down the canal this way here in Ulster County. He had side hustle himself. He would buy boats and hire crews. Captain james rose supplied in all of it all black crew for 33 a month when the white captain wanted 40, a significant so at points up they were marginal like they were they did not get the same the same they didnt get the very anywhere near the same pay but it was an opportunity. Peter chappell hired james rose not guy that wanted seven bucks more above. Its hard, its to find again trying to the marginalized that theyre marginalized its very hard. But quite honestly women the most marginalized ive done presentations. One of them was used as a College Course under colbert, proud to say of the marginalized. But ive done specific the black on the director canal. Ive done child on the canal, ive done immigrants. The dna of the canal. I will, i promise you girls, im going to do women of the day canal. But its going to be tough because we know even less about that. But its same. I was lucky with the data points got and ill continue getting them but you know, this was work that was only the socalled natives, somebody with a little indigenous blood. I, i take issue with that too of there were jobs throughout our history that, that the richer amongst us felt were beneath them. And so theres always been a place these marginalized people up, up. So there you go, dave. Youre supposed to a mike of shame on you youll be right here in high falls the locks on the other side of the round out in the historic period were called the nword box of you know what i mean . People of what we i its my personal belief that they were actually thats side of town is built up against the hill there nothing going on over there high falls was was hoppin there was eight mills over here. We had we had a meat market. We had this tavern. We had a temperance hall, which is whats a temperance, a place to go and not drink. I know i dont know whats with that . I interestingly enough, the temperance folk were also very much of the abolition, but the nword. Its my speculation that. The people that operated them were people of color at some era we have the names of some like tenders. They are white, but going to continue looking into that because thats an interesting sidelight. You know, ive got a whole article that was published in the Hudson River Valley review at Marist College last october of the marginalized populations workers on the drainage canal that that is publicly available probably on various website even i had a question again want a mic first. I know leslie you had question. Well, was there is there evidence that there was there were how shall i put this that white the white people who were working in the locks. Were keeping people of color away. I mean, that sort of a is that is there sort of a built in racism that was preventing people of color from feeling like they could even be employed . Not that i see, but its its always, you know, somethings never changed. That would be i mean, we had the story of the of the dutch. The dutch tender who wouldnt let who proved who hated so thats a whole another. No, not not ive seen and you know, and i have interestingly enough, theres a great online of of of from the national cannibalism that we we helped we supplied images and data of the black workers on the efforts like canals. Remember, there were seven of these canals in the historic era. You know, the native americans, you know, second generation, Third Generation people would consider themselves americans didnt want these jobs. So i dont think dont think there was overt racism. And we do have happen when i might by the article and my presentation on the black experience has virtually every image of a black color. I have in some of them. It could just be the lighting im going to lie to you, you know. But you know, you have got what you got. I had discussion with somebody at the Canal Society, new york, about this a few years back. And they had an intern working, going through their eerie images. And theres got to be a lot more images of the erie canal. It lasted longer. It ran, etc. They could not find one. We speculated that when they went to take a when they went to take the photo, they were like, you moved them out of the image that they wouldnt basically, you know but i havent interestingly i well so there is a story of its got a fascinating there was a family that had a worker and allegedly there was acts of violence against the family even when the black worker wasnt there by knights of labor. Now the knights of labor were of Fraternal Organization that were allegedly egalitarian. So this went against what we know. But, you know, these are lore, these are stories but but here was this was a story of a family who shotguns fired at the boat i mean dangerous stuff its in dorothy sandersons excellent colbert to to call boats to call boats to round out her second secondary source in the seventies. And the only other observation i wanted to make was i think that those wonderful photographs of the of the mules with the that those are feed bags i think. Yes, absolutely weve got weve got baskets and on display here in this museum. Yeah. Yep, yep. No, thats they loved the mules because they could just keep a working at various times. The canal was open, were open 24 hours a day. Eventually. And they say it in Court Testimony. People work better if they get rest. Eventually they force them to close down. They also started right. You know it well. Another great about the delay to the company is that allegedly this is from an 1880s unpublished history in our collections. Again allegedly they initiated the policy of regularly monthly Cash Payments which prior to that were like, no, if you got paid at all. So things that you and i take for granted, you know, the 19th century, you know, we have a we have an account book from a grocer in our collections. Itll be our curators corner and our next canola. It its not even a guy that we do had a grocery but for this book but its clear he gave them credit because hes got all their names including three black canola is its a potent source of of that part of the history and when they paid it crossed out the wonderful thing is and be studying it will be putting up images on our web site eventually as we get to it, because it tells you what they bought, what they were eating, how much it cost. Theres an awful lot of work to be done for various kinds of historians. And im proud to say a lot of that material is in our in our collections. I know we microphone policy all you need to buy im you obey the rules polly come okay i had not heard that rosendale cement was actually invented in high falls. Is this generally known is this wasnt a better one and it wasnt invented because natural cement was known by the romans and. Then the british start figuring it out in the eighth and the 18th century. But the deposits in this area were discovered somewhere. I believe about a quarter mile over here. It was in marble town, new york. Hi falls is a marble tale. The only section of marble town high. Its only right here. So it was nearby. But what happens is they they produce enough cement for their needs, mostly just aqueducts. The stone aqueduct here in high falls, most notably the only stone aqueduct on the day each of the 20 they used it for some bridge abutments and they used it for the other aqueducts. Abutments, in some cases it died down until a guy by the name watson in 1830 invents the continua strong killed. So people here in the northeast see these kilns and they say lime kilns and they are but theyre actually cement lime kilns and so this material gets named for rosendale because rosendale has even more of it. You it became a trade name almost know microphones place because i thought rosendale cement the company name there were 40 cement Companies Just in Ulster County and it was one of them, but it was referred to generically as rosendale cement, basically natural hydraulics, cement. To this day people just call it. It was used in the statue of liberty. It was used in the croton aqueduct, a dam which were, by the way, made by john, that genius engineer used in the u. S. Capital, the new york state thruway. The last project major project. So portland is ascended. But aj snyder, second last cement guy going in rosedale, he discovered or somebody discovered that if you took i think it was seven bags of portland and had a one of rosendale it made a much more superior product. They poured on route 32 or was now im going to find it someday if its still extant they it test strip it indeed it was so good they convinced the state of new york and so the entire new york state thruway and thats a big big little road was the last project to use hydraulics cement albeit this hybrid product. I know we a question somewhere other i ill just go on all night you know but you all know my friends here. Yeah and even even people that just came here for the probably figured that out right. Yes. I built the boat so im interested was it set up so that going back if they had room theyd take passengers or there for a period of time where the people would travel and down on these packard boats, packard boats were a thing on the oceans pack. Boats were called packard boats because they carried mail and passengers. So these boats that were packing boats were in that. E. L. Henry id have to go all the way to slide whatever it was were boats that were designed just for people. The passengers would be on one side, men on the other. They had these little benches. We have a lot of information about how that would fold down and youd be sleeping with a guy up there, a guy up there, women on one side, men on the other. Would just a sheet, a divider, but it told the whole railroads when they first develop. Theyre not good at great weight. Well, the erie canal today still exist for really big things. So the railroads capture, the passenger traffic sooner. While railroads which so we dont have any photographs of packet boats we only have paintings but theres enough of the things in the historic record where they regularly refer pack boats that we know they were a regular thing on the canal. But again, they were also of the oceans. They were packed boats, not just a canal phenomenon. Now, the idea of back cargo. The dean h reserved the right every captain. So these boats carried 130 tons under on your return trip the company could put four tons of stuff on your boat. You just had to do it for you worked for more or less, though you were an independent contractor. One thing i find interesting in the history as i do research that some of the captains would assiduous early caught back up cargo stuff to take on the way back and. Youll see that theyll come home with about 300 bucks in their pocket at the end the year when the regular guys by the time the dust settled they paid all the help and they, you know, they maybe got hundred bucks, 50 to 100 for these common workers. Was was a good 0. 50 a day, was a good wage for these the poor members of society you know, the lower the lower middle classes the lower classes i dont know any other question. A hand of the mic, please. Oh, you need the bike. Everybody needs bike. If i have a bike, you have a bike. Thats the rule, people. I just have a quick question. I dont know if its appropriate, but any major disasters. Oh, tons of them. I try not to talk about those. Well, yes, there were floods, there were drownings were um, there were, you know. Yeah, no, there was, theres, you know, there was mine disasters. There was, you know, there was no these, these i wish i had my here the miners were bowlers thats round. But you know, there were no hard hats there was nobody you know. Yeah. Dangerous. Yeah, lots. Like, you know, drownings, spots where the canal washed out. Those were the most common, you know. But plenty of them, you know. Maybe i should tell more the sad stories. But as a general rule, i just feel like, you know. Yeah, you know, theres always one, though, right . You know, they didnt know if they put more stuff on a boat and it sank. Well, you know, that that there is an interesting anecdote about that so the Canal Company was forced theyre not in the dry dock but so youre selling the boat to this people sometimes its a hired crew. Sometimes they took care of it. Sometimes they didnt. Now think about it. What are you going to do theres something wrong with that boat. When you put 130 tons of coal in it. The Canal Company had to build their own dry dock and so they could have a to get the boats out of there. So in that regard that happened, we know in the in the final they had the 70 mile summit level where they they couldnt get up to six foot of water. In fact, they couldnt get the whole up to six foot of water until 50 to the larger it was done in 50. But they could only put 90 tons of coal in it until they got to the full four six foot of water that the summit level 70 miles of with no locks cut cutting back villain ellisville longest level longest stretch was the hardest to water. They eventually owed 25 reservoirs. It was all gravity fed. Id like to say anytime theres water higher in the canal, they figured out a way to get it down into canal, but summit level in the early years they had trouble getting water in it. Boats would get to the last lock at the pie. Lock lock 51 called the pilot. Mary casey made wonderful custard pies. They say current taste would not find palatable. Where do they get it . How do they figure that out . Youre right. You know, so what they would do is they unloaded a third of the load at one end, went 70 miles, unloaded a third of the load, went back down, picked up the third load load came back, reloaded. And thats what they did because that they wanted to get that hundred and 30 when, you know, so rather than not loading it for that one stretch for i dont know how a period, but i can say definitively thats what they did at that point. But theres a video where i told this story recently. I said, you got to wonder what happened to the cold between it took you about. Three miles an hour or seven. You do the math. You know, presumably somebody was standing guard over the coal. I dont know. You know, youre welcome. And the other questions. Well, thank you very much. Thanks for joining us. Good morning. Hows everyone . Good, good, good. All right. So last time we were talking about the postcivil war south. 1865 to 1900 and the postcivil war