I&M Canal Celebrates 175th Anniversary

LOCKPORT, IL — Six years before the I&M Canal closed for business in 1933, the Forest Preserve District of Will County came into existence and began preserving land that, at times, intersected with the canal route, according to a news release from the preserve.

Because of these intersections, the I&M Canal and the preserve have been intertwined for over 100 years. The preserve is celebrating the 175th anniversary of the I&M Canal with programs sharing the history of the canal region, according to a release.

The Forest Preserve was created in 1927 and slowly began purchasing land to preserve the county’s natural and cultural resources. The 96-mile I&M Canal runs through or near several preserves in the same Des Plaines River Valley that the canal followed as it provided a route from the Great Lakes to the Illinois River and, ultimately, the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico, the preserve said.

The canal route has been preserved as a National Heritage Area, the country's first.

The I&M Canal Trail runs through the Joliet Iron Works Historic Site and McKinley Woods, and it is adjacent to Isle a la Cache, Lockport Prairie and Keepataw preserves.

The canal also once brought materials to Joliet Iron Works in the late 1800s. The Forest Preserve built a section of the I&M Canal Trail that runs north from Iron Works to 135th Street near Isle a la Cache. There are remnants of Civilian Conservation Corps work along the I&M Canal Trail in McKinley Woods, the preserve said.

“The heritage corridor provides us a way to bundle together some of our sites and tell a common story,” Ralph Schultz, Forest Preserve executive director, said in a release. “The story includes the canal, the Des Plaines River corridor and its natural resources, and historical notes of interest from prior to our arrival through canal construction to today.”

In recent years, the trail built along the former canal towpath has served as a recreational outlet for hiking, biking and kayaking.

"The canal is a cultural relic that we’ve turned into a recreational resource," Schultz said in a release.