UP THE MOHAWK TO ROME

It was a 3 day trip from the Waterford locks to the "carrying place" of Rome, NY., overnighting at Amsterdam and Little Falls along the way. The irony of Little Falls is the 40 foot plunge the Mohawk makes through its narrow gorge.  Lock 17 with its 40 ft. lift is chiseled into ancient dense limestone to bypass the falls and is the tallest lock in New York's canal system.
It was near here that we would hunt for Little Falls diamonds in rocky outcrops when I was a boy. I later learned they were quartz crystals.
Abandoned industries were evident all along the Mohawk where the corpses of old mills and factories still stand. An exception is the Remington Arms works at Ilion, NY where fine weapons worthy of our 2nd Amendment continue to be made.  Rome has not fared so well.
Griffiss Air Force Base closed in 1995 halving the population of Rome to 30,000. Gone too is the General Cable Corporation (formerly Rome Wire Company) which produced the Romex wiring that is in practically every home in America. My Dad's Montgomery Ward store is long gone and the Rome I knew as a boy is now only a memory.
Today, the most attractive part of Rome is the Francis Bellamy canal  stop, named for a former boyhood resident of Rome and the author of our National Pledge of Allegiance, written in 1892.
Another observation on the way to Rome is the absence of grafitti.  There seens to be more respect for personal and public property in this part of the country than in California.