The Beardstown and Sangamon Canal was a canal plan developed in the mid-1830s, with avid backing by Abraham Lincoln, then an Illinois state legislator, to make large portions of the Sangamon River between Springfield, Illinois, and Beardstown, Illinois, navigable via a canal to the junction with the Illinois River, which in turn flows into the Mississippi River. The incorporators had enthusiastic backing from local residents and newspapers, but the project was abandoned when an engineering survey of the proposed canal route and accompanying river improvements put the cost at $811,082.