In this lesson students learn how the Erie Canal changed the U.S. economy and influenced settlement patterns in the west.

Students explore the story of the Erie Canal and learn how the creation of the Erie Canal represented a large-scale effort by people to change their environment to be more advantageous to them.

This resource provides information about communities that lived on or near water, including the canals.

U.S. History is designed to meet the scope and sequence requirements of most introductory courses. The text provides a balanced approach to U.S. history, considering the people, events, and ideas that have shaped the United States from both the top down (politics, economics, diplomacy) and bottom up (eyewitness accounts, lived experience). U.S. History covers key forces that form the American experience, with particular attention to issues of race, class, and gender.Senior Contributing AuthorsP. Scott Corbett, Ventura CollegeVolker Janssen, California State University, FullertonJohn M. Lund, Keene State CollegeTodd Pfannestiel, Clarion UniversityPaul Vickery, Oral Roberts UniversitySylvie Waskiewicz

By the end of this section, you will be able to:

Describe the development of improved methods of nineteenth-century domestic transportation
Identify the ways in which roads, canals, and railroads impacted Americans’ lives in the nineteenth century