598 



NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



of not depending upon the waters of the intersecting streams 

 in the western part of the State, but on the contrary considered 

 (and the judgment of the present day justifies them in their 

 conclusions) that it was far safer to depend upon the unfailing 

 supply which could be derived from Lake Erie without, as stated 

 in their reports, " any injury to anybody." 



It is clear, that the Genesee river was an important tem- 

 porary source of supply during the period from 1822 to 1825, 

 before Lake Erie was reached. Although it is evident, when 

 one examines the documentary evidence in detail, that even 

 during those years the canal could have been fully supplied with- 

 out resort to the Genesee river. The question arises then, why, 

 if the Canal Commissioners considered the use of the river as a 

 feeder at an end in 1825, they did not close the channel which 

 had been constructed from the canal to the Genesee river in 

 order to take its waters. A decided answer to this question is 

 found in the documents already cited, from which it appears 

 that the one main object of constructing a canal feeder at 

 Rochester was to open up a communication between the river 

 and the canal, thereby extending, as we have seen the benefits 

 of the State's system of internal navigation to a large and 

 fertile region. The reasons, therefore, why the Genesee feeder 

 was originally constructed were 



1) In order to furnish a temporary supply to the canal during 

 the years 1823-24 and 1825, while the canal was being con- 

 structed from Rochester west to Lake Erie; and 



2) In order to connect the canal system with navigation on 

 the upper Genesee river. 



On an examination of the legislative journals for the years 

 1823 to 1828 we find a number of petitions from citizens of the 

 Genesee valley praying the legislature to improve the naviga- 

 tion of the Genesee river to the south of Rochester. 



It has been generally assumed that the Genesee river was 

 declared a public highway in order that the State might more 

 thoroughly control its waters for canal purposes. The real 

 object was merely to make the Genesee river a part of the in- 

 ternal navigation system of the State. Such declaration did not 

 in any degree give to the State the right to divert the water of 

 the stream into an independent channel like the Erie canal. 



