In 1923, Stanley Newton published “The Story of Sault Ste. Marie and Chippewa County.” This is part thirty-one of a continuing series about the history of Sault Ste. Marie and the area in its early years. I have left punctuation and grammar intact. – Laurie Davis
Fifty-seven thousand passengers and 66,000,000 tons of freight passed through the American and Canadian canals around St. Mary’s Rapids in 1922. The freight was valued at one billion dollars, and in its transportation, 12,000 lockages were made in 252 days. Traffic was heaviest in October, followed by September, August, July, November, June, May, December, and April, in order. American vessels carried 92 percent of the freight, Canadian vessels 61 percent of the passengers.
Approximately 200,000,000 feet of lumber found its way to market here in 1922, and 10,000,000 barrels of flour; 400,000,000 bushels of grain (three-fourths of it wheat), and 42,000,000 tons of iron ore passed down to the bakeries and the steel mills of the world; 60,000 tons of refined Michigan copper were locked through, and 1,000,000 tons of package freight; 200,000 tons of oil and 10,000,000 tons of soft and hard coal passed up. The total tonnage is approximately that of the Detroit River, and it exceeds the totals of the St. Clair Flats Canal. A great deal of the downbound freight traversing St. Mary’s River goes to Lake Michigan and Georgian Bay ports.
The transportation charges on freight passing the Soo canals in 1922 were $64,000,000. The average distance this freight was carried by boat was 810 miles, the average cost per ton for freight transportation was ninety-seven cents, and the average cost per mile per ton was one and two-tenths mills. It is an efficiency record unequalled in the rest of the world.
Water Rates Cheaper
Freight rates in 1922 for water transportation to and from Lake Superior via St. Mary’s Falls Canal averaged forty-five cents per ton for coal; three and eight-tenths cents per bushel for grain, and eighty-three cents per ton for iron ore. Railroad freight rates are gigantic in comparison with this showing. It was made possible by these canals, and so great is their volume that it costs less than half a cent to transport a ton of freight through them.
The vision has come to thousands of practical, level-headed men – and it will not down – of the linking of the Great Lakes in the heart of the continent, to the sea. Nothing can long delay the coming of The-Great-Lakes-to-the-Sea Waterway, for economic forces now at work make it inevitable. To think of Chicago and Duluth, Port Arthur, and Milwaukee, Detroit, Toronto, Toledo, and Sault Ste. Marie as deep seaports is not fantastic; such imagining is based on common sense. No one has better stated the case for a deep waterway than Mr. W. S. Edward, of Sault Ste. Marie, whose address before the Toronto convention of the National Waterways Association of Canada, in March 1921, has been printed and extensively circulated by that body.
Some Comparative Figures
“Traffic through the Suez Canal in 1913, the latest year for which we could get statistics,” says Mr. Edward, was 20,000,000 tons. We have the 1916 report for the Panama Canal, which was built at a cost of over $400,000,000.00, showing ship passages for the year of 1,253 and a total tonnage of 9,400,000.
“Compare this with the 1916 report for St. Mary’s Falls Canal, showing 92,000,000 tons of traffic. Panama passages of 1,253 are equal to about twelve days’ volume through St. Mary’s, where ship passages average over 100 many days at a time. The barriers now separating the farms and cities of the Middle West from the ocean can be overcome by channels not so long nor as difficult to navigate as the Panama Canal, the Kiel Canal, or the Suez Canal, and would cost but a fraction of their expense of construction.
“The time will come when ocean-going boats will carry freight and passengers to Chicago from foreign ports. Chicago is beginning an expenditure of $100,000,000.00 on the improvement of her dock facilities and the building of an immense outer harbor to accommodate this traffic when it comes. The saving in freight alone will more than half pay for these improvements, and the water power development and the commercial growth of the country incidental thereto will, with this saving in freight, more than pay for the entire project every year.
“Let me cite an instance coming under my observation during the war as to the advantage of deepening waterways. A great deal of lake shipping was being taken for ocean service, leaving our carrying bottoms rather short for lake commerce. Mr. L. C. Sabin, government engineer in this district during the war, suggested that if six inches more water could be obtained over Vidal Shoal, it would help the situation materially. I was consulted concerning the probable costs of getting this extra six-inches draft. Figuring on twenty boats per day using this extra draft through the port of Sault Ste. Marie, we estimated that about 10,000 tons freight additional could be handled daily. This meant $10,000.00 additional daily revenues to the carriers, at the same carrying charges and practically the same cost to the ship owners.
Paid for in Thirteen Days
“An emergency appropriation was secured for the work, which was completed in four months at a cost of 125,000.00. This was paid for in additional revenue to the commerce of the lakes in thirteen days’ time. It is a permanent improvement as well, which will enable boats for all time to carry additional tonnage.
“The waterway will make possible the development of two million horsepower for manufacturing purposes in New York State. The same is true of the Canadian side. The manufacturing industries of Ontario and Quebec would be augmented tremendously.
Water power development supplies power at $20 to $25 per horsepower. Power developed by steam costs $100 or over. The saving will amount to $300,000,000 per year, accruing equally to Canada and the United States. With the completion of the Welland Canal, there remain comparatively few miles to be improved in the St. Lawrence River. Neither the United States nor Canada can afford to delay this gigantic development. The benefits to both countries will be enormous, through the industrial expansion and increase in national wealth, which such development will make possible. Let us remove the barriers and open the way to the Great American Mediterranean.”
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