The canal quickly became a major shipper of bituminous coal and pig iron to downstream consumers, as well as a carrier of local agricultural traffic. However, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania was experiencing increasing difficulties in funding the maintenance of its over-extended canal network. The Commonwealth was already involved in the financing of the Bald Eagle & Spring Creek, as guarantor of the annual interest on its stock, and it, together with the Bald Eagle Cross-Cut, the West Branch Canal, and the Susquehanna Division of the Pennsylvania Canal was divested in 1857. These waterways were initially given to the Sunbury and Erie Railroad, to help fund its completion, which in turn sold them to be organized as the West Branch and Susquehanna Canal.