Samuel Galton Jnr invested in The Birmingham Canal Company to increase his profits. The canal network links Sandwell, the Black Country, and Birmingham to the world. Galton Valley Canal Heritage Centre looks after the site of the Watt steam engine produced by the Soho Works. It also has a permanent exhibition on the history of the canal.

Samuel John Galton was as investor in the Birmingham canal company because there was damage to the gun noses when they were transported by road, and he wanted to stop the development of his reputation of faulty guns from putting people off ordering his guns. He would also benefit by cheaper coal and faster movement of the finished product to Liverpool, Bristol and London. Galton was a proprietor of the Birmingham Canal Navigation and bought shares in the Birmingham - Warwick Canal. The BCN shares he had bought in 1767 at £100 each were worth £700 in 1803.

The 2nd Viscount Dudley and Ward was a prime mover in the exploitation of mineral reserves and the development of the road and canal network in Sandwell and Dudley. (Dudley Canal, Dudley to Birmingham Canal link, Staffordshire Worcestershire Canal and Stourbridge Canal ).South of the region another plantation owner, Bertie Greatheed (St. Kitts) invested in The Birmingham -Warwick Canal(1811)

A local nailing industry went back to 1600 but manufacture of tools and gun components was small scale in Smethwick until the advent of the Birmingham Canal Navigation. It was after the cutting of the canal that Oldbury was opened up with four blast furnaces operating from the late 18th Century and the opening of Brades' iron and steel works by William Hunt. Oldbury specialised in edge cutting tools which were in demand for the plantations of North America and the Caribbean.

The opening of the canal transformed the town which has been labelled 'the Venice of the North'. Bradley's, Cresswell's, Horseley's, Dawes, Bagnall and Walker Bros, were iron masters operating in Tipton; Joseph Hall developed wet puddling at Bloomfield and Tipton specialised in cast iron, boilers and steam engines - all in demand in the Caribbean, and elsewhere.