Landsford Canal Explained

Landsford Canal
Location:	Chester & Lancaster counties, South Carolina, USA
Nearest City:	Lancaster, South Carolina
Engineer:	Robert Leckie
Coordinates:	34.7789°N -80.8778°W
Built:	1820–1823^[1]
Architect:	Robert Mills
Added:	December 3, 1969
Refnum:	69000163

The Landsford Canal is a navigation channel that opened in 1823 with the purpose of bypassing rapids along the Catawba River to allow efficient freight transport and rapid travel between nearby communities and settlements along the rural frontiers of the era. It had five locks operating over a stretch of 2miles with an elevation change overall of 32-. It was part of the inland navigation system from the 'Up Country' to Charleston, built systematically from 1819, and the navigations are today the centerpiece of Canal State Park:

The Landsford Canal was the farthest upstream^[1] of a series of river boat navigations built in the 1810s and 1820s by Irish masons under the direction of master contractor Robert Leckie of Scotland – canals built on the Western North Carolina Catawba River and South Carolina Wateree Rivers to provide a direct water route between the upstate settlements and the towns along the Fall Line; river transport being far superior to road transport on the crude, oft muddy tracks that sufficed as roads.^{[1] [2]} It is along a 2adj=onNaNadj=on stretch of the Catawba River in Chester County and Lancaster County west of Lancaster where the fall of the river created a shallow water crossing, a ford named for an early settler who owned the land around the Catawba River, Thomas Land. The lock keeper's house and the canal with three locks is the centerpiece of the Landsford Canal State Park.

History

The canal was designed by Robert Mills. Construction began in 1820, using Irish laborers from the northern United States under the supervision of Robert Leckie. It was long. It was wide and deep. It had five locks for the 32feet descent of the river.

The canal was not a financial success. In 1824, one of the locks collapsed due to a poor foundation. Canal traffic, which was never high, had apparently ceased by 1840. The granite locks and the lock keeper's house survive.^[3]

The Landsford Canal was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1969. Additional pictures, architectural drawings, and information about the lock keeper's house are available from the Historic American Buildings Survey at the Library of Congress. The documentation indicates the lock keeper's house at Landsford Canal was moved from Rocky Mount Canal near Great Falls downstream.^[4]

See also

• List of canals in the United States

External links

• • • Lansford Canal State Park - National Register Site

Notes and References

1. SCdepA&H - Web site: . Landsford Canal, Chester County (off U.S. Hwy 21, Rowell vicinity) . National Register Properties in South Carolina . South Carolina Department of Archives and History . 21 March 2017. (Landsford Canal State Park) Historically, the Landsford Canal, completed about 1823, was an important transportation link for about fifteen years. The immediate area was involved in military movement from the Revolutionary War through the Civil War. The canal remains as the only canal existing in its entirety without encroachment in the state. The Canal parallels a two-mile section of the Catawba River. As part of the inland navigation system from the Up Country to Charleston, a series of Catawba canals were begun in 1819 and completed several years later. Landsford Canal, the highest in the system, was built by engineer Leckie. Within this section, the River falls thirty-four feet. The canal consists of three sets of locks, a mill site, miller’s house, and a lockkeeper’s house, all in various forms of decay and ruins. The tract, including an aboriginal ford, was granted to Thomas Land in 1754, thus the derivation of its name. Listed in the National Register December 3, 1969. -->.
2. Web site: Cox . James L. . Lansford Canal . National Register of Historic Places - Nomination and Inventory . June 2, 1969 . PDF . June 23, 2012.
3. Book: Edgar . Walter . 2006 . The South Carolina Encyclopedia . University of South Carolina Press . 534 . 1-57003-598-9.
4. Web site: Rocky Mount Canal, Lock Keeper's House . PDF . Silverman . Eleni . September 1983 . Historic American Buildings Survey . Library of Congress . 1 . March 9, 2014.