134 Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts, and Letters. 
improvement. The work was to begin within three years after Wis¬ 
consin’s admission as a state and was to be completed within twenty 
years. An act of the Wisconsin legislature in 1848 provided that 
5/6 of the sales should go to improve the Fox River and 1/6 of 
the sales to improve the Wiseonsin. ls This act shows how little and 
how carelessly the facts about the Wisconsin River had been con¬ 
sidered. The legislature evidently believed that the Wisconsin 
River with slight improvement, could easily be made navigable. In 
1849, or about twenty years after the agitation began, the state com¬ 
menced work upon the improvement. By 1850 the lock at De Pere 
rapids was completed. The canal connecting the Fox and Wis¬ 
consin Rivers was dug and a little dredging of shallower portions 
of the river was accomplished. 14 Land sales were much slower than 
had been anticipated, money ran out, interest was accruing on the 
first debt, and work was nearly stopped. An issue of state bonds 
was proposed but this was held unconstitutional by the state legis¬ 
lature. So after spending over $400,000, the state resolved to sur¬ 
render the whole improvement, the remainder of the public lands 
unsold, and the hydraulic privileges to a private company. With 
a number of provisions regarding toll and free use by the United 
States, the whole project was turned over to the “Fox and Wis¬ 
consin Improvement Company.’’ 15 In 1855 Congress passed an 
act giving to the state an additional two sections of land making 
in all five sections per mile for the whole length of the Fox River 
and of the lakes through which it runs, a distance of about 216 
miles. 16 By 1856 the Lower Fox could be traversed by vessels draw¬ 
ing three feet of water and the Upper Fox by boats of slightly less 
draught, 17 Much rejoicing was caused by the arrival at Green Bay 
of the Aquila, a small steamer that had come from Pittsburgh down 
the Ohio and up the Mississippi and Wisconsin rivers and down the 
Fox. A public celebration was held and many believed that the 
long dreamed of waterway which would be used as one of the na¬ 
tion’s most important highways had come into its own. 18 In 1856 
the Wisconsin legislature passed another act providing that the 
capacity of the Lower Fox be increased to a draught of 4 feet; the 
13 Warren, p. 27. 
14 Whitbeck, p. 80. 
15 Whitbeck, p. 80. 
16 Warren, p. 39. 
17 Whitbeck, p. 31. 
18 McLenegan, p. 285. 
