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In winter, canal boatmen tied up in basins across the network of the Erie and lateral canals in New York State. Wherever this transient population went, their lifestyle and culture traveled with them. A majority of boatmen formed floating colonies at the piers in the harbors of Manhattan and Brooklyn as well as in Hoboken and Jersey City in New Jersey. Records and photographs help tell their story. Discover more about their homes, business and social interactions, education of their children, the canallers' regional vocabulary, and the clash of rural and urban cultures in 19th-century New York City.