Construction of the I&M Canal was completed in 1848. It effectively connected the Great Lakes with the Illinois River and enabled the movement of goods by water to and from the Mississippi River. Chicago became an important center of commerce as a result. Peak volume was reached in 1882 and then gradually declined. Some dredging and repairs to locks and aqueducts was done in 1917 but by then the few wooden canal boats still in operation were old, narrow, leaky, and expensive to maintain. The canal was simply too small for the 20th century and eventually it became useful only as local drainage.

Construction of the Hennepin Canal was completed in 1907. It was intended to shorten the distance of lake (Chicago) barge traffic to the Mississippi, especially for commerce to and from the north (St. Paul), and also to provide an alternative to transportation by rail. Increased rail capacity and competition among railways had already lowered railroad transportation costs by the time construction of the canal was completed. Commerce via the canal was mostly local with grain from the feeder region heading east and with gravel heading west. Nonetheless, it served well as a means to experiment with various methods of lock construction, some of which were used when construction of the Panama Canal was begun a few years later. It was closed to barge traffic in the 1930s and operation of the locks ceased in 1951.

Nature is reclaiming both canals to one degree or another. Left alone, they will eventually fill with silt and become little more than odd ripples in the terrain.