page_title: Gathright Dam
section_title: History and construction
hierarchical_section_title: Gathright Dam / History and construction
caption_attribution_description: English: Gathright Dam under construction.
context_page_description: Gathright Dam is an earthen and rolled rock-fill embankment dam on the Jackson River 19 miles north of Covington, Virginia. The dam is 257 feet tall and 1,310 feet long and has a controlled spillway within the structure's southern portion. It creates Lake Moomaw, which has a normal volume of 40 billion US gallons. The dam serves flood control and recreational purposes and is operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
  The Gathright Dam's intake tower contains nine portals that allow it to release water between reservoir depths of 12 to 87 feet. This allows the dam to manage the temperature and flow of water released downstream. This helps mitigate some of the negative environmental effects posed by the dam and manage fisheries downstream.
context_section_description: The Gathright Dam was authorized by Congress with the Flood Control Act of 1946 to provide flood protection of industrial, commercial and residential properties along the Jackson and James Rivers, with immediate impact on Covington, Virginia. Benjamin Cline Moomaw, Jr., a Virginian businessman who was influential in gaining approval for the project and is known locally as "the Father of the Gathright Dam" is the namesake for the lake. The dam itself is named after Thomas Gathright, who owned the land that was flooded by the reservoir.
  Because of setbacks though, construction did not begin until 1974. The dam was finished in 1979 and that December, Lake Moomaw began to fill. The reservoir was filled by April 1982. Filling of the reservoir displaced the small town of Greenwood which had been located at what is now the southern part of Lake Moomaw.
  The reservoir reached its highest elevation in 1996 at 1,598 ft (487 m) above sea-level.
  Environmentalists and the EPA challenged the plan for construction on grounds that the scenic Kincade Gorge and important historical and archaeological sites would be destroyed by the lake. Contesting parties suggested that the dam was constructed for the benefit of the Westvaco paper plant downstream that relied on a regular flow of water to operate.
caption: Gathright Dam construction
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