Union Canal
Cumru Township, Berks County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
In use, 1828-1884. It connected the Schuylkill at Reading with the Susquehanna at Middletown. About a mile east, at tip of Fritts Island, are remains of easternmost lock. It passed boats traveling to and from Philadelphia by way of Schuylkill Navigation.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
For most of the 19th century, before railroads dominated, Pennsylvania moved its goods by water. The Union Canal, opened in 1828, stitched together two of the state's great river systems — linking the Schuylkill at Reading to the Susquehanna at Middletown — so boats could carry freight all the way toward Philadelphia. Near this spot, at the tip of Fritts Island, the ruins of the canal's easternmost lock still hint at the engineering that once lifted vessels across the watershed.
Why it matters
The canal era briefly made inland Pennsylvania a highway of commerce, knitting river valleys together in the decades before the railroad rewrote American transportation.
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Related events
- · Union Canal era, 1828–1884
Themes & tags
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Operating from 1828 to 1884, the Union Canal linked the Schuylkill River at Reading with the Susquehanna at Middletown, stitching together eastern Pennsylvania's waterways in the great canal-building era. Boats hauled coal, grain, and goods along its towpath, a stretch of which can still be traced southeast of here beside the Tulpehocken Creek.