Locks 1 and 2 were
designed to be used for hydraulic power purposes. Why was this so?
Because Lockport was the site of the
largest drop in the canal line about
40 feet between there and Joliet, four miles to the
south.
If the canal had been cut lower than
Lake Michigan as had originally been planned, the Lockport site
would have had unlimited supplies of
waterpower.
If these theoretical plans had been fulfilled,
Lockport would have been the most
important town on the
canal because of these limitless
supplies of power. Hence, by 1836 it was determined that
Lockport would
be
the canal headquarters, so that the
state-owned canal would be the chief
beneficiary of the location. The
state
would be rewarded and the canal helped
by its income from the sale of land and waterpower leases. Thus,
the
1836 Canal Commissioners’ report
notes:
One of the first locks on Section 23 in township 36
nort
hand
range 10 east called Lockport. . . .
Two locks, each of
ten foot lift, are located together at Lockport affording
20
foot fall of a volume of water drawn from the
locks,
sufficient of itself to build up a large manufacturing
town,
without lock or other impediment
separating it from
Chicago.
As a result of the presumed value of the Lockport site, work on the canal here was pursued
more
energetically and rapidly than elsewhere. In 1838 the contracts for
Locks 1 and 2 were let to George
Barnet.
In 1840 an English traveler comments on the canal’s progress
in Lockport:
The works for the canal here were
prosecuted with more
vigor than elsewhere, and the whole place has a
very
thriving aspect. A basin and locks were there
constructed
which gave the name to the
town.
By 1843 the hopes for a large supply of waterpower at Lockport were dashed. The state did not
have
the funds to build the canal on the
“deep cut” plan between Bridgeport and Lockport. Thus, Lockport would
not have a direct access to the waters of Lake Michigan. The main
concern now was sufficient water
for
navigation on this, the summit level. It was decided that main
reliance would be on a steam-driven pump
at
Bridgeport that would pump water out of the Chicago River into the
canal. In addition, a feeder would be
built
(finished in 1852) to carry water from the Calumet River at Blue
Island some 17 miles to the canal at
the Sag,
four miles north of Lemont. This feeder was 40 feet wide and 4 feet
deep, as were all the feeders. The
main
canal was 60 feet wide and 6 feet
deep.
By
the time this decision was made it appears that both locks were
already built. In 1844 Governor
John Davis of Massachusetts, sent to inspect the canal for the foreign and Eastern bankers, reports
in his
journal:
I took a walk upon and down the canal
and found it, as I judge, walled
up
from the bottom nine feet at least and over 100 feet wide affording
a very
spacious and convenient basin well adopted to business. At the
lower end
of the basin is a very beautiful lock
of ten foot lift (Lock No.
1).
In the original plan it was intended to create here a large water
power. But
as the lake feeder is abandoned the success of this scheme must
depend upon
the supply of water derived from other
sources.
In
1847, a full year before the completion of the canal, a reporter from the East wrote this
about
the locks and the canal in
Lockport.
The canal so far as this place is
nearly level, and is for a greater part of
the
way nearly finished. It is faced on the inside with a yellowish
stone, which
is found at different points, and which appears to be a combination
of lime
and sandstone; it is easy to work and lies in quarries in layers of
unequal
thickness, but none of it more than a foot or a foot and a half
thick. At
Lockport the canal must be about 200 or 250 feet in width at
the bottom, and
the locks and abutments are laid in smooth handsome masonry, that
would
do no discredit to any part of our
country.
In
the construction of Locks 1 and 2
their foundations were solid bedrock, so no piles or
other
foundation work was necessary. A three-inch planking was laid on as
the first flooring, and a two-inch
white
oak planking for the second flooring. The walls were built up from
this foundation. The depth of Lock
No.
1 from the coping stones on top of the walls to the bottom was 16
feet.13 The breast wall is five feet
six inches
from the bottom. Since the lock’s lift was ten feet,
six inches this would require gates of 16 feet
height.