Finally, on January 31, 1822, the Legislature authorized engineering and surveying for five suggested canal routes. No time was lost. By the end of the year 1822, enough of their work had been done to insure that the western route running from the Miami River to Lake Erie would be one of the selected routes It was sure by that time that the location of the future town of Saint Marys would be on that marvelous stream.

The years of 1823 and 1824 were deeply involved in engineering, surveying, designing, and locating the exact line of the canal. At the same time, money was being raised and right-of-way being secured. Finally on July 4, 1825, in a muddy field near Akron, Ohio, Governor Morrow of Ohio handed a brand new spade to Governor DeWitt Clinton of New York. To the cheering of thousands of voices of settlers, militia men, a mounted troup of cavalry, and dignitaries of the State, Clinton plunged his spade into the wet soggy earth. Ground had been broken! The canal system had been started!

Two weeks later, the same two Governors along with William Henry Harrison repeated their "sod-bustin" in a field just south of Middletown, Ohio Music from several bands, orations by the famous and finally with a firing squad salute, the Miami and Erie Canal was officially under way.

Even as the first bit of ground was turned in the formal opening, crews of men were lining up in front of the many contractor's offices seeking employment. In most instances there were neighboring farmers, drovers or businessmen who welcomed the opportunity for employment and for gain. Farmers and woodsmen, Irish from the Erie Canal and German immigrants fresh from the hillsides of the Rhine manned the picks and the shovels, shouted at the teams of horses, mules and oxen that moved the dirt. At thirty cents a day-cash wages-they paid off their farms, bought more land or built up a nest egg to use in bringing their families from the Old World. Only a few years later, the Irish alone were sending five million dollars each year to the folks back home.

There were no huge mechanical earth movers, no dump trucks, no compactors during canal digging days. Each inch of dirt had to be dug loose by pickaxe or plow. Long handled shovels hoisted each bit higher than a man's head into a wagon where it would be hauled to the place needed. In some places the canal was to be above the level of the surrounding ground, and here banks had to be built on both sides to contain the water. Other places the canal had to be cut deeply into the ground. At one place known as Deep Cut, just north of Saint Marys, the canal had to be cut through a glacial ridge almost a hundred feet deep and almost a mile long to reach the lower ground on the other side.

Slowly then, inch by inch, mile by mile, the magic ribbon of water crept across the Ohio countryside. In 1827 that part from Cincinnati to Middletown

was in operation. By 1828 the canal was complete to Dayton which was as far as - the first set of contracts had planned. The so called "Miami Extention" that was to carry the system on to Lake Erie was to be the next project. Financial and political problems delayed the development several years. The year of 1835 saw the canal extending to Piqua and at that time the contracts were prepared for the full completion of this effort.

Saint Marys was the center of development activities over the ensuing years. Ohioans were not the only ones to catch the "Canal Fever." Indiana had also been caught in the excitement.

A canal system proposed to connect the Maumee River at Fort Wayne with the Wabash at the old battlefield, Tippecanoe, was started in 1833 and by 1835 was completed.

The contractors there complained of high costs of supplies that had to be brought in through the forests and down the river all the way from Saint Marys, Ohio. This was a situation that lead to some very strong feelings between the two states.