A flotilla of barges arrived in Chicago from New Orleans on June 22, 1933, and marked the completion of one of America’s largest inland navigation projects. The Illinois Waterway created a continuous shipping route that linked the Great Lakes to the Mississippi River, and allowed cargo to move between the nation’s industrial heartland and the Gulf of Mexico without having to rely on rail. It stretches more than 300 miles across Illinois through the Illinois, Des Plaines, Chicago, and Calumet rivers, and quickly became an important commercial corridor that is lined with locks and dams that remain busy even today. According to the Illinois Secretary of State Archives , the opening of the waterway permanently replaced the old Illinois and Michigan Canal for commercial navigation after decades of engineering work.
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