Although so many use them, it can be hard to see how they relate to each other and get a sense of the rich history and culture they were, and remain, a part of. We wanted to open up the subject and act as a way in for people who were neither boat owners nor historians.” She adds: “Each canal has its own special interest story and each region covered gave a chance to explore a different angle of a massive story.” This is the story of the men who built our canals - the navigators or 'navvies'. They represented an 'army'of hard physical men who were capable of enduring tough labour for long hours. Many 'roved' the countryside looking for work and a better deal. We focus on the Manchester Ship Canal - the swansong for the navvies and hailed as the greatest engineering feat of the Victorian Age. The navvies worked at a time of rising trade unionism. But could they organise and campaign for a better deal? Liz McIvor tells the story of the early canal builders who struggled with the rugged terrain of England's Pennine hills. Creating a network of canals in this landscape was an uphill challenge - sometimes literally! But connecting the powerhouses of Yorkshire and Lancashire was a great prize at the time of the industrial revolution. What should the engineers do? Should they build over, under, or around the hills? Who succeeded, and who struggled?

They were used for trade and acted as a catalyst to the industrial revolution between 1770s and 1830s, making a major contribution to transformation of the country.The 1800s were a time of organised labour and campaigns for better working conditions. Friedrich Engels wrote The Condition of the Working Class in England in Manchester, where socialism and revolution were seen as an answer to the injustice faced by workers. By this time, the disparate and disorganised navvies had mostly moved across to the railway construction which had superseded the declining canal building industry. However, there was still the Manchester Ship Canal to complete - the swansong for the navvies and hailed as the greatest engineering feat of the Victorian Age. The men who built our canals - the navigators or 'navvies' - were an 'army' of hard physical men who were capable of enduring tough labour for long hours. Many roved the countryside looking for work and a better deal. They gained a reputation as troublesome outsiders, fond of drinking and living a life of ungodly debauchery. But who were they? Unreliable heathens and outcasts, or unsung heroes who used might and muscle to build canals and railways? There are six episodes in total with themes including engineering, geology, capitalism, heritage, geology, the boat people and the workers.

A new BBC programme, Canals: The Making of a Nation, is set to explore canal routes to tell a deeper story of how our waterways helped change our lives – and how that legacy lives on today. Civil engineering flourished in the era of canals, alongside advances in scientific understanding about the materials and methods engineers could use to build their industrial utopia. The money being made in the industrial revolution gave the early civil engineers a strong motivation to ‘make things work’ at all odds. The hills of the Pennines were a 2000ft high problem, and the hives of industry in Yorkshire and Lancashire needed to be connected – but how? Liz McIvor looks at who built the nation's canal network, who funded it, those who worked on it and how they were regenerated following WWII.​ Our preview videos are intended for broadcasters looking to licence content from the Open University.They gained a reputation as troublesome outsiders, fond of drinking and living a life of ungodly debauchery. But who were they? Unreliable heathens and outcasts, or unsung heroes who used might and muscle to build canals and railways? Liz McIvor tells the story of 'canal mania'- a boom period of frenzied activity that helped develop Britain's modern financial economy, now centred in London. The canal capitalists made money by investing and speculating in the new inland waterways used to carry fuel and goods around the country. Many of the investors were part of an emerging middle class. The Grand Junction Canal - built to improve the connection between London and the Midlands - was one of the new routes, and eventually proved to be a good investment for shareholders. However, not all canals were profitable. The new investors discovered that investment capitalism was a system that created winners and losers.