FINGER LAKES
Our team implemented, explored, mapped, and cataloged the largest and deepest of the Finger Lakes from 2018 through 2024. Seneca Lake and the other lakes in this region are known for their scenic beauty, productive farms, excellent wineries, and outstanding sunsets. There is a long history of competitive sailing and rowing and an even longer history of waterborne commerce. The 19th century maritime history, particularly the history of the canal era, drew us to this lake.
Seneca Lake was at a crossroads of interstate canal systems—including the storied Erie Canal—which allowed products a water route to and from the east coast and the international Port of New York. Akin to our current interstate highway system, this network of canals reaching into the frontiers, forests and coal fields also allowed for western expansion of a young country. The comparative efficiency and ease of moving cargo and people changed the economy and demographics of the world.
Seneca Lake was connected to three historic canals which, in turn, connected to others. With canals intersecting the lake at the south end from Pennsylvania and New York’s southern tier, the lake was then used to move the canal vessels north and into the NYS owned and operated Erie Canal system and its branch canals. Large numbers of canal boats were towed by steam-powered tugboats along the nearly 38-mile-long, deepwater lake. Research convinced us the depths might hold a large collection of intact, wooden shipwrecks from the dynamic commercial period of the 19th century from the 1820s and into the early 20th century.
A modest demonstration survey effort was put in motion in 2018, and we were not disappointed. In just a few days with sidescan sonar, we discovered seven cultural targets. Our work continued over the next few years, and by the end of 2022, we had identified more than 40 intact 19th-century wooden shipwrecks. In 2024, our team completed a systematic examination of all promising sonar targets and was able to complete a 3D image capture of each of these important shipwrecks.
We are continuing our study of the sonar and visual records to identify the features presented by the individual targets. Several examples are attached to this report to illustrate the collection’s research potential. The incredibly good condition of most of the targets is nearly in defiance of the term “shipwreck.” Almost all the intact, wooden “shipwrecks” we found are from the “towpath” era of the New York State canal system. In addition, we identified a subcollection of small watercraft—both historic and modern—one intact airplane and one incredibly intact steamboat.
Having done similar work on Lake Champlain for more than four decades, we borrowed lessons learned there to create a master data set to inventory Seneca’s underwater cultural resources and image the geophysical landscape. While the geophysical study is outside the scope of this brief update, team members Drs. Tom and Patricia Manley were able to help with that aspect in the observations. It has certainly helped to understand the dynamics that formed this underwater landscape, which may still be in motion. The most remarkable observation to date is a field of nearly 70 “pockmarks,” each measuring roughly 30 ft deep and 400 ft across. These may indicate an underlying gas-laden formation located several thousand feet below the lake and we are working with the NY Department of Environmental Conservation to further study this potentially important finding.
As this brief update is being written, it might help the reader appreciate that this new collection of intact canal-era shipwrecks is being presented to the public in 2025, the 200th Anniversary of the completion of the Erie Canal system. Our team is grateful to INA and our other research sponsors for the opportunity to undertake this important and productive study. The final report of the Seneca Lake survey project is in active preparation.
Contact information:
Art Cohn, Principal Investigator
arthurbcohn@gmail.com
Canal Society of New York
info@newyorkcanals.org
315-776-4112
Relevant Bibliography
Cohn, A. and T. Manley. 2020. Seneca Lake Report Archaeological & Bathymetric Survey 2019 Final Report. Canal Society of New York.
Cohn, A.B. 2003. Lake Champlain’s Sailing Canal Boats. Lake Champlain Maritime Museum.
Cohn, A., and T. and Sawtelle. 2020. Eel-Weir Investigation, End-of-Field Report. June 18, 2020. Clyde, NY: Galen Historical Society.
Emerson, G. 2004. A Link in the Great Chain; A History of the Chemung Canal. Chemung County Historical Society and Purple Mountain Press.
Emmons, E. T. 1982. The Story of Geneva. Geneva, NY: The Finger Lakes Times.
Grover, K. 1989. Geneva’s Changing Waterfront. Geneva, NY: Geneva Historical Society.
Harvey, S. 2020. It Started with a Steamboat. Authors Press.
MacAlpine, R. and C. Mitchell. 2015. Steamboats on Keuka Lake. The History Press.
ABOVE: Birdseye View of Geneva on Seneca Lake, 1873 (Geneva Historical Society); a detail from a packet boat period broadside (Canal Society of NY); a teamster “tailing on” a draft animal across the “horse bridge” and into the bow stable of a canal boat. (Canal Society of New York)
PHOTO GALLERY
As we continue the technical study of individual shipwrecks, the potential for new scholarship is very high. Four recently generated 3D images illustrate the collection’s archaeological potential.
Packet boats appeared in the New York canal system in the early 1820s, even prior to the official completion of the canal. They provided travelers a better alternative to the stage coach. These boats were more than the “bus” of their era; they included kitchens, a bar for entertainment, and sleeping quarters in men’s and women’s cabins. We have noted the hull design of these packets appears to be quite different from the canal freight boats, which, by their nature, carried a heavier load with a deeper draft. Packet boats were also allowed a slightly faster speed on the canal, about four miles per hour as contrasted with the slower moving deep draft freight boats. The packet boats were also typically pulled by three horses as opposed to two animals on the freight boats. Packets were viable and popular until the new railroads put them out of business. The timeframe of the packet’s disappearance explains why they mostly survive as artistic renderings and few photos exist. By the 1860s, they were a thing of the past.
The vessel types and construction details are pretty diverse within our newly discovered collection. Above is an intact hull that we believe is the first example of a Seneca Lake region “sailing canal boat” ever located. These vessels, sometimes described as “First-Class Lake Boats,” were specifically designed to sail upon Seneca Lake but also configured to transit the canal. We first documented this vessel design on Lake Champlain in 1980 after locating a shipwreck with both canal sailing features.
One of the important decisions of the early designers of the new canal system was to utilize draft animal power-for moving the boats through the system. It consisted of a uniformed “towpath” along the entire length of the canal and the use of horses or mules walking upon it attached by long towline to the canal boat. Typically, the animals were owned by the canal boat-family operating the boat, or rented from a contractor who kept a barnful of animals for rent. The rental might include a teamster to drive the horses, and stables established every so-many miles to permit swopping out the tired animals for fresh ones.
Canal boat operators who owned their draft animals most often adapted their vessels by building stables in the bow. This would typically allow two animals to be resting aboard while the second team pulled the boat through the system. Changes would occur every six hours or so utilizing a ramp (“horse bridge”) carried on board to be placed to the canal bank. The animals which had just completed their “trick” would be placed on board. The access hatches to the bow stable run athwartship to facilitate the animals entering the stable. Many of the recently discovered shipwrecks have preserved stables which will add much to our study of this important feature.
Not all of the wrecks discovered were canal boats. Within the inventory of targets are small watercraft, including late-model fiberglass runabouts, barges, and even an intact airplane. In about 600 feet of water, a steamboat sits upright with its machinery still intact and aboard. As of this writing, we have not identified the vessel’s name or the circumstances of the loss. We believe from physical evidence on the shipwreck, however, that this vessel started its working life as a small working tugboat affiliated with the canal system. After the reduction in canal traffic with the closure of the Chemung and Crooked Lake canals (1878), the towboat would have been modified to work as a Seneca Lake excursion boat if our theories are correct. We are confident that further research will identify this vessel and its story.
