"In this ancient valley the lowest point on the summit at the headwaters of these two streams is about 460 feet above Lake Superior [Lake St. Croix, at Stillwater, is 117 feet higher than Lake Superior] and 346 feet above Lake St. Croix. Upper Lake St. Croix is 12 feet below this summit. The St. Croix river one mile above the mouth of Moose river is 25 feet below this summit. The St. Croix river discharges 15.360 cubic feet of water per minute at the mouth of Moose creek. The Brule river discharges about 5.805 cubic feet of water per minute in the north part of township 46, range 10. The distance from Taylor's Falls to Lake Superior by the valley of the St. Croix and the valley of the Brule river is nearly 150 miles.
"There are several exposures of trap rock along these streams and an abundance of brown sandstone of good quality for building purposes, being easily worked.
"Can Lake St. Croix, at Stillwater, be connected with Lake Superior by canal and slackwater navigation? Yes. This question has been definitely settled by the recent examination of the United States engineers, under the direction of Maj. Chas. J. Allen, of the sources of the St Croix river, with reference to the construction of reservoirs to improve the navigation of that river and the Mississippi.
"By constructing a dam one mile above the mouth of Moose creek, on the St. Croix, of sufficient height to raise the water 25 feet, cutting a canal 75 feet wide, 12 feet deep, 1-1/2 miles long, across the summit, and building a dam in township 46, range 10, across the Brule river, high enough to raise the water to the same height as the dam on the St. Croix, and you construct a lake over thirty miles long, affording uninterrupted navigation across the summit for that distance, and utilize the waters of the St. Croix and its branches and the Brule, and by the capacity before given the amount of water is sufficient to pass vessels through locks 75 feet wide, 300 feet long, 12-1/2 feet lift, at the rate of 3 per hour, or 73 in 24 hours, at the dryest season of the year. This settles the question of practicability.
"The whole improvement will cost less than $8,000,000, and by placing the lowest dam and lock at Prescott so as to always hold Lake St. Croix at the high water mark will give two hundred miles of slackwater navigation connecting the Mississippi river with Lake Superior, accommodating boats of large size and deep draft, propelled by steam, at the usual rates of speed used on the rivers. Average cost per mile, $40,000.
"It would accomplish another object. The improvement of navigation on the Mississippi river by a system of reservoirs on its tributaries would be most effectually accomplished by holding one or two feet of extra head upon each of the thirteen dams proposed, thus storing up during the spring freshets vastly more water than can be held in the small reservoirs on the tributaries of the St. Croix. There are no very large natural reservoirs in the Upper St. Croix valley.
"Hold a three foot head on the lake as a reserve from the spring freshets and you have stored up 34,073,000 cubic yards of water to be used in the dry season in August and September. Continue this plan to the source and you have in the St. Croix valley a continuous reservoir one hundred and fifty miles long. Connect the two systems as proposed above and you have a route furnishing the cheapest transportation that can be had and at the same time obtain a system of large reservoirs to improve the navigation of the Mississippi river.
"This is one of the improvements that the Northwest needs for its present, future and more perfect development.
"The proposition and figures are given, after a series of examinations extending through a period of over twenty-five years, for the purpose of calling out investigation."