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The Erie Canal, one of the earliest transcendent tales of the American experience, became the nation's first great technical innovation and a gateway to prominence. This documentary by the Syracuse PBS station, WCNY Connected, marks the bicentennial of the start of construction of the Erie Canal. The documentary illustrates how the canal was a route for immense social change. Slaves fleeing the south found safe paths to freedom in Canada along the canal. The ideals of the women's rights movement and the tenets of new and renewed religions were transported along the canal.