Carries River’s Past

She waits where the river chooses to slow, stone-set grace in patient flow. Her walls remember gears and hand, the careful rise, the soft command. Though voices fade and years move on, she holds the past and carries on…

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Built between 1837 and 1841 as Ohio’s largest public works project, the Muskingum River’s 11 locks and 10 dams enabled commercial shipping for 70 years before rail competition and the 1913 flood led to their closure in 1948.

Today, 10 of the original hand-operated locks remain functional within Muskingum River State Park as a National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark. The system is one of only two hand-operated lock systems remaining in the United States, now serving recreational boaters.