of the American Canal Age. In Massachusetts, several ideas were proposed for bringing goods to the principal port, Boston, and connecting to the interior.<ref name=HES-Ch1&2>Roberts, Chapters I and Chapter II</ref> For about three years there were plans to connect the upper reaches of the Connecticut River, above the falls at Enfield Connecticut, to Boston through a canal to the Charles. Connecticut was believed to rise at similar elevations to the Merrimack River's, which could be reached by a string of streams, ponds, lakes, and manmade canals—if the canals were built. In the first two years, rough surveys sought the best route up to the Connecticut Valley; but no route was obviously best, and nobody championed a specific one. A few true believers, but lesser socialites, needed a champion and pestered the Secretary of War, Henry Knox to ignite the project. After the collapse of stocks in early 1793 put paid to a scheme to join the Charles River with Connecticut, championed by Henry Knox, a group of leading Massachusetts businessmen and politicians led by States Attorney General James Sullivan proposed a connection from the Merrimack River to Boston Harbor in 1793. This became the Middlesex (County) Canal system. The Middlesex Canal Corporation was chartered on June 22, 1793, with a signature by Governor John Hancock, who purchased shares with other political figures including John Adams, John Quincy Adams, James Sullivan, and Christopher Gore. The incorporators were James Sullivan; Oliver Prescott; James Winthrop; Loammi Baldwin; Benjamin Hall; Jonathan Porter; Andrew Hall; Ebenezer Hall; Samuel Tufts, Jr.; Willis Hall; Samuel Swan, Jr.; and Ebenezer Hall, Jr. Sullivan was made the company's president; its vice president and eventually chief engineer was Loammi Baldwin, a native of Woburn, who had attended science lectures at Harvard College and was a friend of physicist Benjamin Thompson. Construction The route of the canal was first surveyed in August 1793. Local lore is that it is on this expedition that Baldwin was introduced to a particular apple variety that now bears his name. The route survey, however, was sufficiently uncertain that a second survey was made in October. Due to discrepancies in their results, Baldwin was authorized by the proprietors to travel to Philadelphia in an effort to secure the services of William Weston, a British engineer working on several canal and turnpike projects in Pennsylvania under contract to the Schuylkill and Susquehanna Navigation Company. Baldwin's application to