Canvass White (September 8, 1790 – December 18, 1834) was an American

engineer Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who invent, design, analyze, build and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while considering the limit ...

and inventor. He was chief engineer at the

Delaware and Raritan Canal The Delaware and Raritan Canal (D&R Canal) is a canal in central New Jersey, built in the 1830s, that served to connect the Delaware River to the Raritan River. It was an efficient and reliable means of transportation of freight between Philadelp ...

and he patented

Rosendale cement Rosendale cement is a natural hydraulic cement that was produced in and around Rosendale, New York, beginning in 1825. From 1818 to 1970 natural cements were produced in over 70 locations in the United States and Canada. More than half of the 35 mi ...

, which became the dominant cement in the United States until 1900.

Early life and family

White was born on September 8, 1790, in

Whitestown, New York Whitestown is a town in Oneida County, New York, United States. The population was 18,667 at the 2010 census. The name is derived from Judge Hugh White, an early settler. The town is immediately west of Utica and the New York State Thruway ( In ...

to Hugh White, Jr. (January 16, 1763 - April 7, 1827) and Tryphena Lawrence White (July 4, 1768 - March 30, 1800, a native of Canaan, Connecticut). He received his education at the

Fairfield Academy Fairfield Academy was an academy that existed for nearly one hundred years in the Town of Fairfield, Herkimer County, New York. Founding It was organized as an academy for men in 1802, when the community was an active local manufacturing center. ...

Engineer

White's first job as an engineer was on the

Erie Canal The Erie Canal is a historic canal in upstate New York that runs east-west between the Hudson River and Lake Erie. Completed in 1825, the canal was the first navigable waterway connecting the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes, vastly reducing t ...

in 1816, working for chief engineer Judge

Benjamin Wright Benjamin Wright (October 10, 1770 – August 24, 1842) was an American civil engineer who was chief engineer of the Erie Canal and the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal. In 1969, the American Society of Civil Engineers declared him the "Father of America ...

. In the autumn of 1817, he travelled to

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

to study their canal system. When he returned he patented a type of natural cement,

which was used to build some of the major works in the US including the Delaware and Hudson Canal and Brooklyn Bridge. He continued his work in New York until 1824. From 1824 until the summer of 1826, he was Chief Engineer on the Union Canal in Pennsylvania. He was appointed Chief Engineer of the

in 1825 and of the

Lehigh Canal The Lehigh Canal, or the Lehigh Navigation Canal, is a navigable canal that begins at the mouth of Nesquehoning Creek on the Lehigh River in eastern Pennsylvania. It was built in two sections over a span of twenty years, beginning in 1818. The low ...

in 1827. He was also a consulting engineer for the Schuylkill Navigation Company and for the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal. He became President of the Cohoes Company when it was incorporated on March 28, 1826. He was also highly involved in the design of the

Croton Aqueduct The Croton Aqueduct or Old Croton Aqueduct was a large and complex water distribution system constructed for New York City between 1837 and 1842. The great aqueducts, which were among the first in the United States, carried water by gravity fro ...

though the position of chief engineer eventually went to

John B. Jervis John Bloomfield Jervis (December 14, 1795 – January 12, 1885) was an American civil engineer. America's leading consulting engineer of the antebellum era (1820–60), Jervis designed and supervised the construction of five of America's earliest ...

. Of White, author

Bill Bryson William McGuire Bryson (; born 8 December 1951) is an American–British journalist and author. Bryson has written a number of nonfiction books on topics including travel, the English language, and science. Born in the United States, he has b ...

writes, "the great unsung Canvass White didn't just make New York rich; more profoundly, he helped make America."Bryson, Bill ''At Home'', Doubleday, London 2010, page 194

Works

Works of White's that survive include: * Carbon County Section of the Lehigh Canal, along the Lehigh River Weissport and vicinity, Pennsylvania, listed on the

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic ...

(NRHP) * Enfield Canal, along Connecticut River from Windsor Locks N to Thompsonville Windsor Locks, CT, NRHP-listed *

, Lehigh Gap to S Walnutport boundary Walnutport, PA, NRHP-listed *

, Walnutport to Allentown section, Allentown and vicinity, PA, NRHP-listed *

: eastern section, Glendon and Abbott Street industrial sites, Lehigh River from Hopeville to confluence of Lehigh and Delaware Rivers

Easton, Pennsylvania Easton is a city in, and the county seat of, Northampton County, Pennsylvania, United States. The city's population was 28,127 as of the 2020 census. Easton is located at the confluence of the Lehigh River, a river that joins the Delaware R ...

, NRHP-listed * Lehigh Canal Allentown to Hopeville Section, along the Lehigh River,

Bethlehem, Pennsylvania Bethlehem is a city in Northampton and Lehigh Counties in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania, United States. As of the 2020 census, Bethlehem had a total population of 75,781. Of this, 55,639 were in Northampton County and 19, ...

, NRHP-listed * Union Canal Tunnel, west of Lebanon off PA 72

Lebanon, PA Lebanon () is a city in and the county seat of Lebanon County, Pennsylvania, United States. The population was 26,814 at the 2020 census. Lebanon is located in the central part of the Lebanon Valley, east of Harrisburg and west of Reading. ...

, NRHP-listed

Death

White died in 1834 and was buried in

Princeton Cemetery Princeton Cemetery is located in Princeton, New Jersey, United States. It is owned by the Nassau Presbyterian Church. John F. Hageman in his 1878 history of Princeton, New Jersey refers to the cemetery as "The Westminster Abbey of the United Stat ...

Princeton, New Jersey Princeton is a municipality with a borough form of government in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It was established on January 1, 2013, through the consolidation of the Borough of Princeton and Princeton Township, both of whi ...

References

Sources

:"Canvass White, Esquire (1790-1834): Civil Engineer." (1983) ::Lists biographical information was obtained from the following sources: Charles B. Stuart, Lives and Works of Civil and Military Engineers in America (New York, 1871); William P. White, "Canvass White's Services" in Buffalo Historical Society Publications, Vol. 13 (Buffalo, 1909), 353:66; and the American Society of Civil Engineers, A Biographical Dictionary of American Civil Engineers (New York, 1972), 126-27.

External links

*

ASCE : Canvass White
{{DEFAULTSORT:White, Canvass 19th-century American inventors American surveyors American civil engineers American canal engineers People from Whitestown, New York 1790 births 1834 deaths Burials at Princeton Cemetery Erie Canal Engineers from Florida Engineers from New York (state)