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Boonton, New Jersey, circa 1900. "Boat ascending plane, Morris and Essex Canal." (Actually just the Morris Canal, but whatever.) At right, the Bowden Bottling Works. View full size.
Also still there in Poland.
I would think the operators of the Morris Canal wouldn't charge much for letting someone paint the bottom of boats as they ascend and descend over a New Jersey hill. But the painters are gonna have to work fast. I think it was like a car wash.
What an interesting photo for a couple of reasons. The first is the location. My old boss is from that area of New Jersey. The second reason is when they moved to Virginia in the late '80s, they purchased a marina that had a railway used for hauling boats out of the water so the bottom could be painted. Although the railway in this photo was used for lifting or lowering the canal boat to other parts of the waterway system it is very similar to what we used at the marina for pulling boats out of the water to be painted.
You can see a lock like this on the Trent Severn waterway in Ontario, Canada. The railway crosses a road as part of the operation. Here is a YouTube video of how it works.
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