A traveler along the route from the Hudson to Lake Erie can still visit the choice remains of New York's once incomparable canals. Few who came upon these aging stone locks & tumbled aqueducts actually view them for what they really are--our Nation's pyramids. From its very beginnings, the Erie Canal, a project of tremendous imagination & ingenuity, had the makings of myth & folklore. Its dimensions staggered the imagination. It vibrated with the gusto & exuberence of a young & confident nation. Certainly to the people of the nineteenth century, the Canal was a catalyst for heroic actions. In this work Marvin Rapp is more concerned with the lives & lore of the people the Erie Canal touched & shaped. CANAL WATER & WHISKEY is not written as a tightly drawn historical tome. It is instead the prize collection of a connoisseur. Rapp pursued stories on the Old Erie like others sought rare prints or period furniture. His treasures of historical vignettes, tall tales, etc. has much in common with a box of old plate glass photographs. It provides evidence of a world now all but vanished. As we thumb through it, that world springs back to life.