and Holyoke, where it is sixty feet, — conveniently distributed along a river front of one and a half miles, -- from which point to the sound there is no considerable fall save the Enfield rapids, and a waterway navigable for boats and barges can be readily maintained throughout. The great valley, embracing a drainage area of eight thousand one hundred and forty-four square miles above Holyoke, bordered east and west by ridges of the White Mountain system, doubtless first found an outlet at New Haven, but by some prehistoric upheaval the Holyoke range, a detached member of the system, was severed, leaving Mt. Tom on the west and Mt. Holyoke on the east of the great chasm, and the stream, turning rapidly eastward, at length reached the sea thirty-five miles east of the probable original outlet. From the vicinity of the twin mountains, which stand as grand watch towers overlooking the interesting scene, the stream flows easterly nearly three miles, then, bending northerly a half mile farther, it sweeps southward about three miles more, forming with the subtending mountain background the right-angled triangle which is the site of the city now known to fame through its leading industry as the "Paper City" of the world. No human knowledge tells how many ages were occupied in spending the fearful agencies that hardened the earth's crust, that folded and seamed it with mountains, hills and valleys, that piled up the river's rocky border and ground out its adamantine bed, to form and preserve these waiting rapids for the age of machinery. The place selected for the great dam lies between two bold, rocky promontories, a half mile or more above the right angle, from the southernmost of which now spreads out Prospect Park and from the northernmost the highlands of South Hadley Falls village. This location was determined August 17, 1847, through a survey begun July 29; the charter was granted the succeeding winter, and work was immediately begun with a large force of men under the general supervision of Mr. Ewing, who had secured for the company its valuable lands and franchises. In July of this year the Fairbanks Company withdrew from the corporation, and soon afterward Mr. Ewing resigned his position, giving place to Mr. C. B. Rising of Northampton, who conducted the work to the date of its completion, November 19, 1848. The fame of the great structure brought thousands to view it, and on the day appointed for stopping all openings in the dam and filling the pond behind it, the river banks and neighboring bluffs were alive with eager witnesses of the inauguration of the greatest water power then known to history. After the dam was closed, when the waters below the dam receded from the river's bed, hundreds of men and boys swarmed over its ragged surface, seizing belated fishes imprisoned in the pools and basins and enjoying a merry holiday where but a few hours before the tumbling waters and their finny children disported unrestrained. The gates had been closed at ten o'clock A. M.; soon afterwards serious leaks appeared in different parts of the structure, and as the struggling waters rose higher and higher even the engineers began to fear that the force of the pent-up waters had been greatly underestimated. The visitors were hastily recalled from the river's bed, and all watched eagerly for the sure and rapidly coming proof of strength or weakness of the great work. These laconic telegrams were sent to the company in Boston: "10 A. M. Gates just closed; water filling behind dam." "12 M. Dam leaking badly." "2 P. M. Stones of bulkhead giving way to pressure." "3.20 P. M. Your old dam's gone." Eye-witnesses of the catastrophe characterize the scene as at once grand and awful. Breaking loose from all moorings, the huge mass, 1,017 feet long and 30 feet high, was rolled over and over by the angry flood and, breaking into many
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