Never in the history of invention did a new device more fully meet the traditional "long-felt want." Here was a growing nation made up of a fringe of colonies strung along an extended coast.

No roads were built.

Dense forests blocked the way inland but were pierced by navigable streams, deep bays, and placid sounds.

The steamboat was the one thing necessary to cement American unity and speed American progress; but a full quarter of a century passed after Fitch had steamed up and down the Delaware before the new system of propulsion became commercially useful.
The inventor did not live to see that day, and was at least spared the pain of seeing a later pioneer get credit for a discovery he thought his own.

In 1798 he died--of an overdose of morphine--leaving behind the bitter writing: "The day will come when some powerful man will get fame and riches from my invention; but nobody will ever believe that poor John Fitch can do anything worthy of attention." In trying to make amends for the long injustice done to poor Fitch, modern history has come near to going beyond justice.