History of New York City (1784–1854) surged far beyond its rivals, reaching a population of 1,080,000 in 1860, compared to 566,000 in Philadelphia, 212,000 in Baltimore and 178,000 in Boston. Historian Robert Albion identifies four aggressive moves by New York entrepreneurs and politicians that helped it jump to the top of American cities. Of greatest importance, it sponsored the Erie Canal which began operations in 1825, forming a continuous water route from New York north to Albany via the Hudson River, then west to Buffalo using the new canal to reach the Great Lakes. It opened a large new market in upstate New York and the
History of the British canal system not where a river happened to be. The claim for the first pure canal in Great Britain is debated between "Sankey" and "Bridgewater" supporters. The first true canal in the United Kingdom was the Newry Canal in Northern Ireland constructed by Thomas Steers in 1741. The Sankey Brook Navigation, which connected St Helens with the River Mersey, is often claimed as the first modern "purely artificial" canal, because although it was originally a scheme to make the Sankey Brook navigable, it included an entirely new artificial channel that was effectively a canal along the Sankey Brook valley. However, "Bridgewater" supporters