On the broader streams, where fording was impossible and traffic
was perforce carried by ferry, the canoe and the keel boat of the
earliest days gave way in time to the ordinary ‘flat’ or barge
On the broader streams, where fording was impossible and traffic
was perforce carried by ferry, the canoe and the keel boat of the
earliest days gave way in time to the ordinary ‘flat’ or barge.
At first the obligation of the ferryman to the public, though
recognized by English law, was ignored in America by legislators
and monopolists alike. Men obtained the land on both sides of the
rivers at the crossing places and served the public only at their
own convenience and at their own charges. In many cases, to
encourage the opening of roads or of ferries, national and state
authorities made grants of land on the same principle followed in
later days in the case of Western railroads. Such, for instance,
was the grant to Ebenezer Zane, at Zanesville, Lancaster, and
Chillicothe in the Northwest Territory. These monopolies
sometimes were extremely profitable: a descendant of the owners
of the famous Ingles ferry across New River, on the Wilderness
Road to Kentucky, is responsible for the statement that in the
heyday of travel to the Southwest the privilege was worth from
$10,000 to $15,000 annually to the family. But as local
governments became more efficient, monopolies were abolished and
the collection of tolls was taken over by the authorities. The
awakening of inland trade is most clearly indicated everywhere by
the action of assemblies regarding the operation of ferries, and
in general, by the beginning of the eighteenth century, tolls and
ferries were being regulated by law.
