Canal Town

Canal Town is the title of a 1944 novel by Samuel Hopkins Adams.

The novel is set in the 1820s in the town of Palmyra, New York, near Rochester, located on the Erie Canal. The novel opens in 1820, when the construction of the Erie Canal had just begun, but has not reached Palmyra, and most of the town is looking forward to the economic boom the Canal is expected to bring.

During the course of the book, Adams depicts the changes in the daily life brought about by the construction of the canal. By the close of the book, citizens in Palmyra are regularly and casually travelling to Rochester via packet boat on the canal, or to New York by canal packet to Albany and thence by steam packet down the Hudson.

On publication, a New York Times review by Catharine Brody noted that the book recalls the Erie Canal novels of Walter D. Edmonds, whom Adams acknowledges in his introduction. In fact, Edmonds allowed Adams to use his notebooks as background for the novel.

The book is constructed around a single plot device, a case that a Dr. David Little reported to the Albany County Medical Society in the early 19th century. Brody called the incident "a truthful old-wives' tale."

The chief protagonist is a young doctor, Horace Amlie. He is intelligent and dedicated, willing to treat both wealthy and indigent, and willing to accept barter in lieu of cash when necessary. He knows of the latest advances in medical science, such as vaccination against smallpox, and comes into conflict with an established doctor who prefers older treatments such as bleeding. Brody called him "an Arrowsmith in a high beaver hat."

Amlie visits a settlement called Poverty's Pinch, treats the sick, and pays respectful attention to an old woman named Quaila Crego who practices folk medicine.

Work on the canal is constantly interrupted by sickness and fever among the workers. He asks Crego whether the fever has broken out in the Pinch and takes notice when she says "It will, when the black moskeeter stands on her head."

Amlie's dedication brings him into melodramatic conflict with landowners who resent his efforts to enforce public sanitation, and with a wealthy and powerful landowner named Genter Latham.

Amlie becomes acquainted with a spunky adolescent girl named Araminta Jerrold and her best friend, Genter Latham's daughter Wealthia. Araminta admires Amlie and it comes as no surprise to the reader when she and Horace are married later.

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