HISTORY & MYSTERIES
The promenade across Ossining’s famous Double Arch has been restored and will be reopened on Saturday, July 20, with an event taking place from 4 to 6 pm. To celebrate, we've assembled a group of images relating to this famous local landmark. On May 21, 1839, the Westchester Herald said the "stupendous arch" over the … Continue reading Celebrating Ossining’s Double Arch
These aerial and ground photographs were taken by Jack Boucher in 1978 and are now part of the Historic American Engineering Record collection of the Library of Congress. The collection includes a large number of photographs and plans documenting the original Croton Dam, the New Croton Dam and the entire aqueduct system.
This is an often photographed view of the New Croton Dam, but this particular image from 1912 captured an automobile driving along the road which once ran across what is now the Old Croton Aqueduct Trail. For an equally romantic image of "driving" out to the Dam, see this earlier post.
These two nineteenth century puzzles, showing the Old Croton Dam and High Bridge, were part of a set called Sliced Objects, published by E. G. Selchow & Co., circa 1867 to 1880. The puzzles came in a box (shown below) along with puzzles of other New York landmarks—the Bethesda Fountain, St. Paul's Church, the statue … Continue reading Croton Aqueduct Puzzles
This map and graph were published in the May 23, 1908 issue of Scientific American. They show the locations of the different reservoirs within the Croton watershed after the New Croton Dam was completed and their relative elevations. Click the image to enlarge it.
This 1906 plan of the downstream elevation, prepared by the New York City Aqueduct Commission, comes from the Historic American Engineering Record collection of the Library of Congress. The collection includes a large number of photographs and plans documenting the New Croton Dam and the Aqueduct. The record for this specific item is here. Click … Continue reading New Croton Dam, 1906
This detailed engraving shows the New Croton Dam when it was under construction in 1896. The image was commissioned for the cover of the October 17th issue of Scientific American magazine to accompany an article entitled "New York Water Supply—Present Condition of Work on the Great Croton River Dam." Christopher Tompkins, author of The Croton Dams … Continue reading New Croton Dam Construction, 1896
This image of the Croton Reservoir in Central Park is from a stereoview, taken as part of Deloss Barnum's "Views in Central Park" series. Barnum, who during his career was referred to by several variant names, was a photographer in Boston and New York in the mid-19th century. This rare stereoview is currently for sale on eBay, and the … Continue reading Croton Reservoir, circa 1865
By any measure, the New Croton Dam is an engineering marvel. For 14 years (from 1892 to 1906) 1,500 men used more than 500 pieces of heavy machinery, 745,000 barrels of cement, 100,000 tons of coal and an incalculable quantity of locally quarried stone to build the dam. How did they do it? These images … Continue reading New Croton Dam Construction Plan, 1898
This is a detail of the Croton area from the map The Route of the New Aqueduct from Central Park to Croton Dam . . . prepared by the Aqueduct Commission in 1884. The route of the new aqueduct tunnel is the dark straight line, running diagonally across the bottom from Croton Dam. One of … Continue reading New Croton Aqueduct Map, 1884
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