Erie Canal, Eastern Half

Slept in a little later this morning. Slept well as I used ear plugs last night so I wouldn’t hear the trains blaring, but I think there were fewer trains after 10p, although Rosanne said she heard trains at 4:30a and 5:10a. Right after breakfast I went across the park to log a geocache located about 500’ away. Then we went for an 8.5 mile bicycle ride. First to Fort Johnson, and then back to Amsterdam on the other side of Riverside Park. Fort Johnson was the home of Sir William Johnson. It was the third Mohawk Valley house that he built, and was an important military post and Indian council place of 1754-1760. It was built in 1749 and once the largest house in the Mohawk Valley. The house is currently under repair. Passing the VW Beetle on the smokestack again this morning, with much better lighting from the sun, I had to shoot a few more photos.
On the western edge of Amsterdam is World War I Memorial Park. An important feature of the original park was a captured German cannon, locally called “Big Bertha”, this was most certainly not. Dicke Bertha was much larger cannon, whose specifications exceeded even local exaggeration. Only two were removed to the United States at the end of the war and both have been accounted for. The cannon most likely featured in our park is a long barrel 15cm Schwere Feldhaubitze (lg 15cm sFH 13), the standard heavy gun of the German field artillery. When it was proposed to scrap it in WWII to “send it back to its creators in bombs and bullets”, many veterans objected but the mayor and director of civil defense prevailed. It was sent to a Cherry Street scrap yard where it was destroyed. At the request of the city, in 1950, the US Army supplied a replacement. This cannon, commonly misidentified as a French 75mm, is actually a US Army 3 inch Field Gun, M1903/5. Similar in appearance and purpose to the French 75, these were left behind in the overseas movements of WWI to standardize equipment and ammunition. Ironically, Amsterdam received a much rarer piece; over 3,500 15cm sFH13 were built, but only 350 M 1903/5. Of the latter only a handful survives, most in indoor museums. Amsterdam’s is one of the only surviving outdoor examples. (I copied this description right from a sign in the park.)
We also passed St Mary’s Hospital School of Nursing. No relation to the employment Rosanne retired from last year, however her employer was St. Mary’s Hospital in Madison, and she was a nurse. So I had to take a photo. Lol
I love some of the older buildings and homes here. So a few photos of those were shot as well.
Back at the boat, we departed the lock 11 wall and headed for lock 12. More history to be seen, we stopped about half way at Yankee Hill double lock (Enlarged Erie Canal Lock 28) at the eastern end of Schoharie Crossing. Built in 1841 with a lift of eight feet, and operated from the 1850’s until 1916. This lock had two side by side lock chambers, each measuring 110 feet long by eighteen feet wide, that let boats going in opposite directions lock through at the same time. One of the lock chambers was lengthened in 1885. Yankee Hill Lock was the last double lock completed in eastern New York. The Panic of 1837, subsequent national depression, and the “stop and tax law” passed by New York in 1842 ultimately slowed the progress of all public works projects. Although builders William Coleman and John Taylor began its construction in the early 1840’s, it was not completed and operational until the 1850s. The building is the restored Putman Canal Store, exhibiting the grocery stores on the old Erie Canal. If you look closely at the photos of the locks, notice how intricate the stones fit together. These were cut by stone masons and match the precision of any good carpenter today. It’s just amazing to see the work that was done by hand so many years ago. The word “Enlarged” is referring to the second generation or second rebuild of the Erie Canal.
Smooth ride locking up at lock 12 and then we stopped in Fonda on the canal wall here near a Canal Maintenance/Office facility. This is the highest wall we’ve tied up to. We heard about the Fonda Dairy Bar, and after riding our bikes 8.5 miles today, had our hearts set on ice cream and figured we’d get supper there as well. So we managed to climb the 7’ high wall off our boat (an ungraceful accomplishment for Rosanne, her words, not mine!) Only to find out they are closed for the season! No way I expected Rosanne to be able to get back on the boat, (and probably shouldn’t have attempted to get off), I untied from the wall and went about 100 yards to a small boat launch cement dock to pick her up. (I was a little more graceful getting off the boat, and just stepped on the roof and down on to the bow when we came back.)Read more