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Start Over You searched for: Places Potomac River. Remove constraint Places: Potomac River. Subjects Canal construction workers. Remove constraint Subjects: Canal construction workers.

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Collection

Potomac Company collection, 1785-1822 (majority within 1785-1795)

7 items

This collection contains 7 items pertaining to the Potomac Company's administrative affairs in the late 18th century and to its efforts to create canals along unnavigable portions of the Potomac River.

This collection (7 items) contains correspondence and documents related to the work of the Potomac Company in the 1780s and 1790s, particularly regarding its administrative affairs.

James Rumsey's 3-page letter of September 6, 1785, describes the difficulties he encountered while working on the river, such as an insufficient number of tools and trouble paying laborers. In his letter of April 15, 1786, Abel Westfall proposed furnishing rations for the company's workmen. Other items are an order for the company's financiers to provide funds (March 2, 1786), William Weston's letter to Potomac Company president John Fitzgerald, providing notice that he had been authorized by the Schuylkill and Susquehanna Canal's managers to work for the Potomac Company (February 9, 1795), and documents from the company treasurer, authorizing John Fitzgerald to vote, or another man to vote on his behalf, at meetings (July 21, 1789, and July 1795). A partial letter from Isaac Briggs to Governor Thomas M. Randolph discusses a method of using cones to create map projections and mentions a projection by "Hamstead" (June 14, 1822).