Four Locks

At Prather’s Neck, the Potomac River makes a meandering four-mile loop, so canal engineers cut the canal one-half mile across the neck to avoid the bend. Because of the rapid elevation change, four locks were needed to lift canal boats a total of 33 feet. A small but busy community grew up there, where children went to a one-room schoolhouse still standing down the road, mules rested in the nearby barn after long canal miles, canal boats loaded and unloaded cargo at the warehouses at Locks 49 and 50, and other boats were repaired at the dry dock at Lock 47.

Maryland · United States