1854-1913 Miami & Erie Canal Locks #1,#2,#3,#4,#5 in Lockington, OH

(Satellite, 204 photos)

These five locks raised the Miami & Erie Canal 67' (20.4m) to the highest point on the canal between Cincinnati and Toledo. Since this was the summit of the canal, a feeder canal was built starting from a little northeast of Port Jefferson, OH.

These are the top two locks.

Street View, Sep 2024

This clearing allows us to not only see those top two locks, but part of the hill that the canal had to climb. The upper lock is obvious on the right side of the view. We can see only part of the far wall of the lower lock on the left side.

Street View, Sep 2024

Jim Kerste, May 2023

This photo and the above plaque clued me into the fact that there are more than just the two locks we can see from the streets.

Nathan Brown, Apr 2022

Ohio Unfiltered posted

Before railroads and highways, Ohio ran on canals, and you can still see the proof of it near the tiny community of Lockington. 🛶

The Miami and Erie Canal once stretched from Cincinnati up to Toledo, and the locks at Lockington were built to lower boats down a steep drop in elevation, a serious feat of 1800s engineering done almost entirely by hand. For a while, towns along that canal boomed because of the trade moving through them.

Once railroads took over freight in the late 1800s, the canal era faded fast, and a lot of that infrastructure was left to the weather. What's left at Lockington is quiet now, stone walls sitting in a field, but it's a reminder that Ohio's economy has already reinvented itself once before.

Did you know Ohio used to be crisscrossed by canals, or is this the first you're hearing about the state's canal era?

The three lower locks are lost in the shadows in the current (Nov 2024) satellite map. So I fired up Google Earth. We can clearly see all five locks in this image.

Google Earth, Nov 2021

The cartographer omitted the uppermost lock.

1914/31 Tory Quad @ 62,500

VisitSidneyShelby
"The extensive stair step canal lock walls, among the best preserved in Ohio, were part of the Miami and Erie Canal system which opened for navigation in 1845 and connected Cincinnati and the Ohio River to Toledo and Lake Erie. For decades, the canal provided Ohio with valuable transportation and waterpower. The lockmaster’s house—now a private residence—and a dry-dock basin for boat repair are still visible."

18:24 video
Best-Preserved (and COLLAPSING?) 19th Century Locks!

@ 14:20