Kansas City daily journal., 1895-10-21

Futile Efforts to Eli Hole In tho
Ground.

AT Towantic, a little village on top of
the mountain. ten miles west of Water
bury Conn, the New York & New En-
gland Railroad Company is endeavorlng
To fill in what is apparently a bottomless
pit. The pit is exactly on the top of
the mountain, at an elevation of fully
1000 feet When the route for the rail-
road was surveyed it was directly across
this swamp, the nature of the marsh, of
course, not being known. 1t is only
about 200 feet from one edge to the other
but what it lacks in width it makes up
in depth, and 1t has proven TO be prac-
tically without bottom,
When this point was reached in con-
structing the roadIbed, it was decided to
build a trestle across the swamp as the
quickest and most practical way OF get
ting over. The first piles THAT Were
dropped endwISe in the mud prepara-
tory to driving them down to a solid
foundation sank nearly out of sight of
their own weight. Other poles We're
placed on top of the first ones and easily
forced down to depth of nearly sixty
feet. Upon these poles the bridge, which
| is nearly 200 long, was built, and II has
been thorn in the side of the company
ever since Eternal vigilance has been
the price of keeping She railroad from
sinking out of sight, and 1t was finally
determined to I'LL in the hole. But this
Is proving to be a formidable feat.
Before the work of putting in gravel
was begun II new track resembling Il
| horseshoe was constructed around the
edge of the swamp, TO be used while
the old bridge was being filed in. This
was done from a fear that the gravel
would settle and force the structure out
of place, and the precaution was Well
taken. Work was begun early in the
summer by putting in hundreds of old
ties 10 serve as a foundation for the
ground. Already 1000 carloads of gravel
have been dumped into the swamp from
the bridge, and II settles out OF sight
nearly as fast as it can be put in
Engines are not permitted TO cross
the bridge any longer, A trainload of
gravel Is pushed out on the bridge the
wire cable of a big iron plow drawn over
the covers, forcing the gravel off on
either side. This material is loaded upon
the cars by big steam shovel in a near
by gravel bank and the loading and un-
loading is but the work of a few mo-
ments. But the porous and false bed
OF the pit has an enormous appetite for
the material that Is dropped into It, and
II will be some time before the yielding
soil Is made firm enough to hold the
heavy trains that must pass over II.
1t is "a curious freak of nature that
such a place should be located at the
peak of a mountain, but II Is not with
out parallel, An almost Identical diff
fculty was encountered by this same
company when building its road over the
chain of the old Fishkill mountains in
New York state. The road here skirts
|
which covers several hundred acres.
Gravel and rocks that We're dumped into
| the roa I bed here during the day would
disappear In the night and at one time,
when trainload OF soil was being un-
loaded, the filling slipped from under
1t. carrying several cars into the pond.
| These Were never recovered, as they
went completely out of sight In the mud.
| While gravel was being fed into this
apparently bottomless pit without inter-
| ruption ID was noticed that an Island
was gradually rising out In the lake
| fully 1000 feet from the shore. This
| phenomenon continued Just as long as
| the road bed continued to settle and was
caused by the pressure OF the soil and
rocks that We're disapnearing as fast as
| they could be unloaded, This island
grew to considerable proportions and
when II stopped the road bed became
| solid, and has never caused any trouble
| since This will probably be the re-
suit of the attempt To hll up the hole
at Towanttc.-Hartford Times.