The Raging Erie

Life and Labor Along the Erie Canal

De: Mark S. Ferrara

Narrado por: Jack de Golia

The completion of the Erie Canal in 1825 was a monumental achievement. Linking the Great Lakes to the Atlantic Ocean, it transformed New York City into a hub of international trade, drove the rise of industrial cities in once sparsely populated areas, and accelerated the westward expansion of the United States. Yet few of the laborers who toiled along the canal shared in the prosperity it brought.

Mark S. Ferrara tells the stories of the ordinary people who lived, worked, and died along the banks of the canal, emphasizing the forgotten role of the poor and working class in this epochal transformation. The Raging Erie chronicles the fates of the Native Americans whose land was appropriated for the canal, the European immigrants who bored its route through the wilderness, and the orphan children who drove draft animals that pulled boats around the clock. Ferrara also shows how the canal served as a conduit for the movement of new ideas and religions, a corridor for enslaved people seeking freedom via the Underground Railroad, and a spur for social reform movements that emerged in response to the poverty and suffering along its path.

Brimming with vivid characters drawn from the underbelly of antebellum life, The Raging Erie explores the social dislocation and untold hardships at the heart of a major engineering feat, shedding light on the lives of the canallers who toiled on behalf of American expansion.

The book is published by Columbia University Press. The audiobook is published by University Press Audiobooks.

©2024 Columbia University Press (P)2025 Redwood Audiobooks

Reseñas de la Crítica

"A terrific and necessary book about the deeper depths of the Erie Canal and the underside of the American Dream...A must-read. (Richard S. Newman, author of Love Canal)

"Ferrara reconsiders the Erie Canal by casting a wider net than any previous study." (Ryan Dearinger, author of The Filth of Progress)