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Aramingo Canal
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| Site Name | Aramingo/Gunner's Run Canal |
| PASS# | 36PH0153 |
| Dates of Excavation | 2007-2008 |
| Phase of Excavation | Phase I, II, and III |
| Number of Units | 0 |
| Number of Features | 1 |
| Number of Trenches | 3 |
| Associated Periods | Nineteenth century |
| Site Acreage | 0.17 |
The construction of the canal required the Gunner’s Run stream channel to be deepened and straightened, followed by the construction of wooden bulkheads and wharves along its shores. Originally intended to extend more than five miles inland, from the Delaware River to Frankford Creek, only about 1.5 miles of this route were ever fully completed. Though only ever partially realized, the Aramingo Canal did, for a time, help to significantly improve the economic status of this community, and led to establishment of many prosperous industrial enterprises and new residential blocks along its shores.
Site History Summary
For about 25 years the Aramingo Canal did help to spur the growth and development of the local community. Over time, however, the constant dumping of industrial waste, residential garbage, and other refuse into the canal, along with the channeling of its waters into nearby sewers, gradually transformed the waterway into a stagnant, inky-black, disease breeding tidal inlet. By the mid 1880s, the canal was described as little more than a “shallow and open latrine,” a “vast leeching cesspool, a menace to the health of the population, and an eyesore to the city at large,” and people began calling for its removal. At the same time, local doctors regularly complained of the canal’s role in spreading disease – particularly the deadly outbreaks of typhoid fever and malaria that struck every summer. In 1899, thePhiladelphia Inquirer reported that “the old bulkheads and wharves are rotting away, and falling to pieces by small degrees, and are picturesque enough when photographed – for a picture is free from odor … the filthy tide that now fills the stream is noisome enough to disgust even a sewer rat.”
In the 1890s, the city began the process of doing away with the Aramingo Canal. Beginning first at its northern end, engineers channeled its waters into large brick storm sewers, filled its prism with soil and landfill material, and paved it over with newly created surface streets. By 1895, the open-water portion of the canal only extended from the Delaware River to Norris Street, where it terminated in a timber bulkhead. The massive engineering effort required to remove the last remnants of the Aramingo Canal began in 1900, and by 1902 it was no more.
What did the Archaeological Excavation Reveal?
Field excavations at the Aramingo/Gunner’s Run Canal Site uncovered a crib structure representing the wall of the Aramingo Canal and an inlet for the Gillingham and Garrison sawmill. The foundation of a portion of the William Cramp and Sons machine shop was also revealed. The Aramingo Canal was constructed within the meandering channel of Gunner’s Run. The walls of the canal were of crib construction similar to many wharves of the period. The maximum height of the extant wall was 8 feet, but estimates indicate it may have originally been some 10 to 12 feet high.
Large companies located south of Girard Avenue used the canal to deliver a variety of necessary raw materials, including coal, sand, and raw timber. The companies included lumber mills, rolling mills, glass manufacturers, and a stove company. The Gillingham and Garrison mill had a logway from the canal inlet to the mill building, suggesting that the presence of the canal was critical to its operation.
The canal was expensive to maintain and not used as intensively as anticipated. Sewers emptied into the canal and waste from adjacent factories further contaminated the water. Artifacts recovered from within the canal prism consist primarily of bottle glass dating to the late nineteenth century, and almost certainly were introduced during the final in-filling of the canal channel. The canal was removed from the city plan in 1889 to be filled and replaced by Aramingo Avenue following construction of the Aramingo sewer within the canal bed.
As a final note, archaeological and historical information gathered during this investigation indicates that the Aramingo Canal, though long removed from the collective memory of local residents, still exists and remains more or less intact beneath the surrounding cityscape. Surviving documents and accounts of the canal’s transformation to a sewer show that the original timber side walls of the channel were not destroyed in that process, but rather were left in place and utilized to help frame the active work and construction space in the former canal bottom. As a result, there is good reason to believe that much, if not all, of the full canal prism—from the vicinity of Lehigh Street to the Delaware River—remains preserved below portions of Aramingo Avenue, the Aramingo Shopping Center parking lot, the I-95/Girard Avenue intersection, Richmond Street, and Dyott Street.
Site Page
Aramingo Canal
| Site Name | Aramingo/Gunner's Run Canal |
| PASS# | 36PH0153 |
| Dates of Excavation | 2007-2008 |
| Phase of Excavation | Phase I, II, and III |
| Number of Units | 0 |
| Number of Features | 1 |
| Number of Trenches | 3 |
| Associated Periods | Nineteenth century |
| Site Acreage | 0.17 |
The construction of the canal required the Gunner’s Run stream channel to be deepened and straightened, followed by the construction of wooden bulkheads and wharves along its shores. Originally intended to extend more than five miles inland, from the Delaware River to Frankford Creek, only about 1.5 miles of this route were ever fully completed. Though only ever partially realized, the Aramingo Canal did, for a time, help to significantly improve the economic status of this community, and led to establishment of many prosperous industrial enterprises and new residential blocks along its shores.
Site History Summary
For about 25 years the Aramingo Canal did help to spur the growth and development of the local community. Over time, however, the constant dumping of industrial waste, residential garbage, and other refuse into the canal, along with the channeling of its waters into nearby sewers, gradually transformed the waterway into a stagnant, inky-black, disease breeding tidal inlet. By the mid 1880s, the canal was described as little more than a “shallow and open latrine,” a “vast leeching cesspool, a menace to the health of the population, and an eyesore to the city at large,” and people began calling for its removal. At the same time, local doctors regularly complained of the canal’s role in spreading disease – particularly the deadly outbreaks of typhoid fever and malaria that struck every summer. In 1899, thePhiladelphia Inquirer reported that “the old bulkheads and wharves are rotting away, and falling to pieces by small degrees, and are picturesque enough when photographed – for a picture is free from odor … the filthy tide that now fills the stream is noisome enough to disgust even a sewer rat.”
In the 1890s, the city began the process of doing away with the Aramingo Canal. Beginning first at its northern end, engineers channeled its waters into large brick storm sewers, filled its prism with soil and landfill material, and paved it over with newly created surface streets. By 1895, the open-water portion of the canal only extended from the Delaware River to Norris Street, where it terminated in a timber bulkhead. The massive engineering effort required to remove the last remnants of the Aramingo Canal began in 1900, and by 1902 it was no more.
What did the Archaeological Excavation Reveal?
Field excavations at the Aramingo/Gunner’s Run Canal Site uncovered a crib structure representing the wall of the Aramingo Canal and an inlet for the Gillingham and Garrison sawmill. The foundation of a portion of the William Cramp and Sons machine shop was also revealed. The Aramingo Canal was constructed within the meandering channel of Gunner’s Run. The walls of the canal were of crib construction similar to many wharves of the period. The maximum height of the extant wall was 8 feet, but estimates indicate it may have originally been some 10 to 12 feet high.
Large companies located south of Girard Avenue used the canal to deliver a variety of necessary raw materials, including coal, sand, and raw timber. The companies included lumber mills, rolling mills, glass manufacturers, and a stove company. The Gillingham and Garrison mill had a logway from the canal inlet to the mill building, suggesting that the presence of the canal was critical to its operation.
The canal was expensive to maintain and not used as intensively as anticipated. Sewers emptied into the canal and waste from adjacent factories further contaminated the water. Artifacts recovered from within the canal prism consist primarily of bottle glass dating to the late nineteenth century, and almost certainly were introduced during the final in-filling of the canal channel. The canal was removed from the city plan in 1889 to be filled and replaced by Aramingo Avenue following construction of the Aramingo sewer within the canal bed.
As a final note, archaeological and historical information gathered during this investigation indicates that the Aramingo Canal, though long removed from the collective memory of local residents, still exists and remains more or less intact beneath the surrounding cityscape. Surviving documents and accounts of the canal’s transformation to a sewer show that the original timber side walls of the channel were not destroyed in that process, but rather were left in place and utilized to help frame the active work and construction space in the former canal bottom. As a result, there is good reason to believe that much, if not all, of the full canal prism—from the vicinity of Lehigh Street to the Delaware River—remains preserved below portions of Aramingo Avenue, the Aramingo Shopping Center parking lot, the I-95/Girard Avenue intersection, Richmond Street, and Dyott Street.