White made the negative for this image in 1898, the year he helped found the Newark (Ohio) Camera Club. Probably taken in that city, it shows buildings and poles lining a canal, seen from an elevated viewpoint. It is one of his best-known early images and unusual for him in that it is not a figure study. White played a key role in pictorial photography both during and after the heyday of the Photo-Secession. He became widely known as a photographic educator, running his own school in New York. His work always featured soft-focus effects and a quiet, personal mood.