The daily morning journal and courier., 1904-03-15
ICE FLOES IN HOUSATONIC
PERIODS OF THE GREAT RIVER
 WHEN ON THE RAMPAGE.

Propsray-sems of the oid Saw. Con- csralag This Body or wassr-The Great Food ofIsss -Rivsr Road Rest dent. Forced C. Abnnaon Home. Tassday Night
 There has been much speculation for some weeks past as to the probabilities of a big ice flood in the Housatonie this spring. and most of the old saws that come down to US frDm our fathers have been quoted. Among these are:
 'The river never breaks up by snow water melted by the sun."
 After March there is no danger. as the ice will melt out"
 Floods do not follow excessively cold. snowy winters"
 Exceptions prove rules and all these wise sayings are to be relied on only in a general way.
 The first and third were set at naught about February 1. 1857. The winter up to that time had been a record breaker. For several weeks in succession the days were so cold that the caves did not drop on the south side of my fath- CTS house and there was plenty of snow. All at once the weather changed from extreme cold to unseasonably warm. The result was that, without a
 
 drop of rain, there was the worst flood in the river, as a whole. that has hap pened within my memory.
 Hardly a bridge was left on the stream and at Derby the damage amounted to thousands of dollars. . Ice was piled high on the railroad at what is now Derby Junction. and a scow be- longing to Beach Downs, then a neigh bor of ours. was left across the track about where the little station now stands.
 In 1888 we must have had flood early in March, as the selectmen ar ranged for opening the road on Satur- day, before the great blizzard, which delayed the work for some time. It Y Wktp tt QlS tlcOu,f cllQ We I6Q Pltnty Ol sightseers calling on us the day before the blizzard, one party of whom pilot ed over the ic etc Zoar Bridge
 EFFECTS OF NEW DAM.
 Since the building of the dam at Der by the section for some four miles near the upper end of the pond is sub ject to ice foes in an exceptional man. ner.
 During the construction of the dam there was much speculation as to the effect of the ice on the pond, some ar guing (my father, who enthusiastically favored the dam, among, therl} that the depth of water would carry the up-river ice under the ice on the pond and over the dam, while others thought there would be trouble.
 MT. Potter, the engineer-in- chief, publicly took the former ground, but on the quiet he told Mr. Naramore, then postmaster at Derby, to advise any friends of his living at the upper end of the pond to move out, as the ice would never go through the pond. got the advice and it was good, although pretty solid ice has gone through the pond.
 Living as we do at the point appar- ently of greatest danger, we are natu- rally a little nervous when the, ice is breaking up, but we have so far escap- ed damage, although the river has been high enough above and below us to flood us out and once came high enough here to do so, but fell off rapidly before the low ground back of and below the house was filed
 4 CONDITIONS NECESSARY FOR
 FLOODS
 It was close call Had the rain that fell on Monday come two or three weeks sooner the story might have been dif- ferent. The river was then full of very solid ice and the chances, no matter how much water fell, of it's breaking two-thirds of the way down the pond would have been slender While take little stock in old sayings as security I do rely on the improbability of the CO., incidences that would be necessary to flood us happening often. Tn the first place, there must be a large quantity of ice in the river. Secondly, it must be broken up so that it will all come down in twelve hours, and, thirdly it must stop at the head of the pond or at Otter Rock.
 In the late flood, so disastrous to the peCple pelOW us, our Safety lay in the tremendous amount of rain that fell in D few hours and the fact that the lit- tie rains and the sun had somewhat weakened the ice. There was really nc crush of ice coming from above to force it's way as the volume of water floated the ice, in this part of the river, down into the pond, before the up-river ice could get here to make trouble.
 On Tuesday afternoon, nearly twen- ty-four hours after the river began te break up here, miles of ice passed ou, place coming from a gorge at New Milford, carrying with it the New Mil. ford bridge and loads of driftwood Watching such a flow of ice is quitt different from watching the breakins np of the river, or hearing 1t, for it usu ally starts in the night.
 There is nothing pleasant in hearins mass of ice and water thirty feel deep and thousand feet wide movins along with a force that seems irresist ible, jarring the ground as great cake. strike a rock on the side or at the bot tom of the river, unless one is sure O safety. It doesn't add to the pleasure when one starts out with lantern t. see how things are, to find the hous
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