Second only to such obstructions was the "Falls of the Ohio," the one spot in all its course of nearly a thousand miles where steamboat navigation was impossible until the construction of a canal, which followed the route of the ancient portage path two and one-half miles in length between the present sites of Louisville and Shippingport, Kentucky. In this distance the Ohio makes a fall of about twenty-five feet caused by a ledge of rocks extending across the river. Steamboating is impracticable here save only when the river is at flood-tide.
A company was incorporated by the legislature of Kentucky to cut a canal around the falls in 1804, but nothing was done until January 12, 1825, when the Louisville and Portland Canal Company was organized, with a capital of $600,000. The stock was taken by about seventy persons, residing in Kentucky, Ohio, Missouri, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, the United States holding 2,335 shares, and 1,665 issued to private individuals. Many difficulties attended the construction of the work, which was not completed until
