Tap the Power of the Dams

New England has many hills of all sizes. The beauty of New England is those hills, and the white steeples poking up through the trees in the valleys below.

New England also has rain, fairly evenly distributed throughout the year. The rain trickles down the sides of those hills. Creeks form and grow into brooks. Brooks become small rivers, and the small rivers flow into the big river at the bottom, where the town is. Along the course of these trickles is a dam, a small one near the top, a bigger one further down, and perhaps a huge one at the bottom.

There are thousands of these dams in New England. My hometown of Conway, N.H., has one. In the Connecticut town where I now live, Ridgefield, I would not have to look far to find three of them. I doubt that there is a town in any of the six states that does not have at least one.

They are unused, and have been for the better part of two centuries. The textile mills went south, and the lumber mills went west. The dams remained, because there was no point in removing them. Many are lovely to look at, many are decrepit. Some exist only if you have eyes for where they used to be.

Hartford Courant