Overview

In Steamboat Connections Frank Mackey gives us a narrative account of the first twenty-five years of steam navigation along the St Lawrence and Ottawa Rivers. Relying on a wealth of primary archival sources, Mackey focuses on the development of steamer traffic from 1816 - when the foundations were laid for the first stage-and-steamboat line between Montreal and Upper Canada - to the early 1840s - when locks, canals, innovations, and human daring conquered the rapids on those rivers and allowed for navigation between Montreal and the Great Lakes. He shows how, starting in 1841, small steamers ran ""the circuit"" - down the rapids of the St Lawrence to Montreal and then back up to Kingston and other Great Lakes ports via the Ottawa River and the Rideau Canal. Mackey introduces the entrepreneurs who forged this important link between Montreal and the nation's interior and chronicles the course of their industry, correcting previous misinterpretations. He sheds light not only on steamboats but also on the social, commercial, and geographical development that they made possible. He shows that the history of this country, a land with vast expanses and a harsh climate, cannot be fully appreciated without looking at the different modes of transportation that made it possible.

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9780773520554

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Steamboat Connections makes a substantial, original contribution to the descriptive history of marine transportation between Montreal and Kingston ... Mackey's mining of the notarial records is impressive. M. Stephen Salmon, business archivist, National Archives of Canada Mackey's work rests on a huge body of primary documents that substantially update the research in this field. His sources are excellent [translation]. Jean Belisle, Department of Art History, Concordia University

Steamboat Connections makes a substantial, original contribution to the descriptive history of marine transportation between Montreal and Kingston ... Mackey's mining of the notarial records is impressive. M. Stephen Salmon, business archivist, National Archives of Canada Mackeys work rests on a huge body of primary documents that substantially update the research in this field. His sources are excellent [translation]. Jean Belisle, Department of Art History, Concordia University

Author Information

Frank Mackey is the author of Steamboat Connections: Montreal to Upper Canada, 1816-1843, and Black Then: Blacks and Montreal, 1780s-1880s.

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