The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Industrial Canal and Inner Harbor of
New Orleans, by Thomas Ewing Dabney
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
Title: The Industrial Canal and Inner Harbor of New Orleans
History, Description and Economic Aspects of Giant Facility
Created to Encourage Industrial Expansion and Develop
Commerce
Author: Thomas Ewing Dabney
Release Date: February 25, 2010 [EBook #31383]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK INDUSTRIAL CANAL ***
Produced by The Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images
generously made available by The Internet Archive/American
Libraries.)
[Illustration: WILLIAM O. HUDSON
President, Board of Commissioners of Port of New Orleans]
FOREWORD.
Oh the mind of man! Frail, untrustworthy, perishable--yet able to stand
unlimited agony, cope with the greatest forces of Nature and build
against a thousand years. Passion can blind it--yet it can read in
infinity the difference between right and wrong. Alcohol can unsettle
it--yet it can create a poem or a harmony or a philosophy that is
immortal. A flower pot falling out of a window can destroy it--yet it
can move mountains.
If Man had a tool that was as frail as his mind, he would fear to use
it. He would not trust himself on a plank so liable to crack. He would
not venture into a boat so liable to go to pieces. He would not drive a
tack with a hammer, the head of which is so liable to fly off.
But Man knows that what the mind can conceive, that can he execute. So
Man sits in his room and plans the things the world thought impossible.
From the known he dares the unknown. He covers paper with figures,
conjures forth a blue print, and sends an army of workmen against the
forces of Nature. If his mind blundered, he would waste millions in
money and perhaps destroy thousands of lives. But Man can trust his
mind; fragile though it is, he knows it can bear the strain of any task
put upon it.
All over the world there is the proof: in the heavens above, and in the
waters under the earth. And nowhere has Man won a greater triumph over
unspeakable odds tha
|