Panama Canal expansion is a key factor in linking the Louisiana production to Asian markets.

FORBES: U.S. Policies And Economic Doldrums Fuel Chinese Energy and Tech Grabs

Back home Morris was a key promoter of the Erie Canal, which made New York the commercial center of the new nation--and indeed of the world.

FORBES: An American Giant

The key was not to try to dig a Suez-type of canal, a great sea-level trench from ocean to ocean, but to create a lock-and-lake canal, where the ships are lifted up by a series of locks to a man-made lake, and then they sail across that lake, and then they are set back down on the other side by another series of locks.

FORBES: Fact and Comment