ALMOND HISTORICAL SOCIETY

JUNE 2001 NEWSLETTER

PART I:  THE 1940S ALMOND DAM PROJECT 

BY DONNA B. RYAN

“The Search for the Missing Houses” could be the title of a story that has resulted from finding an interesting newspaper clipping in the Hagadorn House archives. This photo, along with other clippings, photos,  and stories from “long time” residents,  prompted us to talk to those who could fill us in on “what it was once like” in the Almond Dam area prior to its construction more than fifty years ago.  And to find someone who could tell us the final destination of this house being moved through Canacadea Creek.

            Gladys Preston Farley, who has lived most of her life in this area, became a wonderful resource for us as she began to describe the three-mile stretch of now uninhabited roadway between Almond and Thacherville.  Try to picture these former landmarks on the old Almond Road:  Large productive farms with unusual barns and multiple outbuildings, herds of dairy cattle grazing in pastures and cash crops growing in the fields,  the high-framed Goff Bridge with its infamous sharp curve, the Co. K National Guard rifle range, the Fresh Air camp for “city kids in Richtmyer’s Grove,” Coleman’s repair garage and used car sales, greenhouses, nurseries and family-owned vegetable stands, the McManus    Tourist Inn, many favorite “hangouts”, including the Beacon Inn, and an innumerable variety of well-kept family homes.  These were just some of the places displaced by the dam project, some of the remains of which you can find tucked in between the enormous pine trees, forgotten lilac bushes and tell-tale sumacs which now line the road.

            The story started after the Flood of 1935 devastated the Canisteo Valley, according to Bill Cleveland, who has been head dam operator for the past 22 years. After that, the Flood Control Act of 1936 was passed, which allowed the Federal Government to get into the flood control business.  He explained that the Army Corps of Engineers was established more than 200 years ago, and because their expertise was engineering, they were commissioned to build the dams.  He went on to tell that the Arkport Dam, completed in 1939, was the first one built in the Baltimore district and is one of the oldest constructed by the Corps of Engineers.  

The Almond Dam project was “in the works” at the same time, and at that same time the government began soil and rock testings on the Frank Ranger Farm, located near the Goff Bridge and now under Almond Lake waters.  Chub Lockwood, who lived with the Rangers and worked as a hired hand, remembers:  “The first any of us knew about the dam project was around 1938, when they started digging test holes on the farm.  These pits were 12 feet by 12 feet, dug by hand and lined with planks so they would not collapse.  The government paid Frank to haul their apparatus around by horse and wagon.”   Their simple equipment, described by Frank’s son, Curt, consisted of old type gas engines, tripods, pulleys and ropes, and shovels.  A neighbor, Lewis Wheeler, paints this picture:  “This was all done by hand, and they worked even in the winter, digging those holes. You’d look down and wonder what was way down in there.   But they could not put the spillway where it would erode away, and they kept digging until they hit rock bottom.” 

            Then the war came, and there was no more money, so the digging stopped.   Headlines from various Evening Tribune clippings in 1941, provided by Marian Oakes of Hornell,  read:  “Almond Dam Job Hinges On Its Defense Status”, “Almond Dam Prospects Now Reported Remote,” and “Postponement of Almond Dam Arouses Protest:  Cite Defense Value”.  The articles describe Hornell City Mayor Ernest G. Stewart’s push for the dam project, and noted that he had written US Senator James Mead, “urging construction of the Almond Dam as quickly as possible because it is needed for the Erie Railroad and other local industries engaged in defense work.” But Mead’s reply was not positive.  He noted that he was “fully aware of the importance of the Almond Reservoir”, and promised that when funds “become available for new projects every consideration will be given to starting it at the earliest practicable date.”

            It was five years later, after the war was over, that the project began again in earnest.  Landowners were contacted and the government began making offers to purchase parcels for the undertaking. The Ranger place, formerly the Bayless farm, was situated in a strategic location for the construction project.  Marked as a “borrow area” on the Corps of Engineers map, the property provided gravel and fill for the actual construction of the dam, spillway and tunnel.

Although it was only one of several farms taken, Lewis believed it was one of the biggest operations that was displaced.  “It was a good farm.  He (Frank) was a good cowman and was so patient with them.  He raised feed for them and could make them give more milk than anyone,” he said.  Chub agreed, saying,  “Frank Ranger’s farm was the best one on Pennsylvania Hill.  It was a dairy farm, but he also had fruit trees, a sugar bush, and he raised potatoes as a cash crop on ‘Round Top’, where the dam tower is now located,” he said.

Curt remembers his father being very upset about having to leave the farm.  “It was ridiculous dealing with them.  We never got anything near the value of the farm.  They would park their equipment as close as they could to the barn to keep putting pressure on us to sell out to them.  They started building the dam and we had not even moved off yet,” he said. 

“Frank finally moved a short distance away to the John Peake place on the Webbs Crossing Road.  It was a step down – he went from a working farm to 32 acres,” Chub said.  “The barn was not as big, and had to be changed over.  Our old farm was a lot better farm with really great flat land, fruit trees, berries, sugar bush, and was self-sustaining,” Curt added.

They were able to make arrangements to use some of the adjoining land, but pasture land was at a premium, Chub recalls. With a twinkle, he added that Frank was known to sometimes “let” his cows graze back in their “old pasture” in the dam basin, which proved to be a consternation to the dam operator at the time.  He noted that he came to Frank once and said, “Your cows are getting into the dam basin,” to which Frank responded, “When you survey the land, I’ll build a fence.”  The dam operator conceded, saying, “Ill let you know when the government inspectors are coming and you can be sure that your cows aren’t down there. . . .” 

Among other properties taken was the Hagadorn farm, which was a large parcel of land with a couple of houses, barns, and several outbuildings located on the old County road, a section of which adjoins the PA Hill Road near the Kanakadea Recreation Area entrance. Don and Bernice Burdett, “discovered” the property in 1947 and purchased the farm’s tenant house in 1947 for $500.  Bernice, now 99 years of age, vividly remembers the immense undertaking, and still has her journal that reveals the expenses they incurred during the extensive project.  A three-acre field, about a third of a mile away, was acquired for $400, and the challenge of moving it to higher ground began. 

The house was cut in half between the living room and dining room and jacked up off the old stone foundation.  The open sections were then carefully maneuvered and securely fastened onto steel tandem wheels connected to a large dump truck. Assisted by another smaller pickup truck, the convoy slowly inched the house to its new site about a half mile away. Home movies of the event, now on video, reveal the structures being pulled by antiquated reddish-orange 1930’s trucks and equipment owned by a man by the name of Bauer, whose total bill for the move was $710.

 Rain and the moving crew’s irregular work schedules hampered the operation, and at one point the two sections were marooned in the lower end of the new lot for several days.  The Burdett family, anxious to “live in the country”, “camped” in that section one night.  The next morning, Bernice left for a little while to take her husband to work in Hornell.  “When I came back, the movers had surprised us, showed up to work, had hooked their truck onto the rig and were moving the house through the lot.  They did not know that my children were inside – and the girls were having a great adventure, riding in that house,” she laughs. 

The Beacon Inn, a favorite local hangout, was also a dam project “casualty.”  Purchased in the early 40’s by Leo Burdick and Harold Whitford from former owner Leon Claire, it was termed a “very popular spot” by its patrons. The horseshoe-shaped bar, tended by such popular personalities as Tom Guthrie, John Gorton, and Leon Hanks, was the site of much camaraderie and good fellowship.  “People came from all over – and they had their favorite bartender,” one person remembered.  “There was always music and singing there. Leo Burdick was a drummer, and he would play his drumsticks on the bottles on the back bar.  If they weren’t exactly in tune, he would have to drink a little out of the bottle to tune them up.” Stories abound of witnessing the roll of the dice, which determined Leo to be the partner who would receive the US Government relocation funds.  The business was reestablished on the Almond Road below the dam, and was later sold to John Ninos, who built a large addition on the building.  Some years later, it was the Eagles Club, and today is vacant.

Many folks witnessed the complicated moving of the Zirkelbach house, located on the Almond Road below the dam. Phil MacMichael tells of that house being moved “clear over to the North Main Street Extension area via PA Hill.  It was spectacular seeing them go down the steep grade to Webbs Crossing,” he wrote via e-mail.  Gladys Farley recalled the move as well, and described the house “sitting” at the foot of that hill for a couple of days, because of lack of permission to cross the railroad tracks.  She remembers that they resolved the problem this way: “At that time, there were multiple tracks there, several trains went through each day, and they could not obtain the permits.  Finally after a couple of days, they just took their chances and crossed as quickly as they could between trains!”

The Lewis McManus farm, located near the present intersection of Rt 21 and Pennsylvania Hill Road, was a modern 140-acre farm, the site of many Cornell University field trips, according to Stacy Pierce.  His in-laws worked the farm along with their son, Richard, and at one time had 7 hired men and 7-8 teams of horses.  “It was a full production farm,” he shared. 

He termed the operation “state-of-the-art”, featuring a huge barn built in the shape of an “H” with self-supporting rafters. “One of those legs was dismantled and taken up to the Gerald Baker farm on Jericho Hill, where it still stands today,” Stacy stated.  His mother-in-law, Josephine McManus, was known as a very hospitable woman who also operated a tourist home in her 17-room house. Bums riding the Erie railroad frequently visited her kitchen, looking for a good home-cooked meal.  “She gave them the same full plate of food she would give anyone else who came by,” Stacy remarked. 

The house was also the site of many social events attended by big crowds of neighbors and friends. “They would roll up the carpets, move all the furniture into the front room and have a square dance on Saturday nights,”  he recalls Josephine telling. 

Family members relate that the McManus operation was eventually moved to the Mark Karr farm, located just south of the Alfred Almond Central School, and was later operated by Bob Jefferds. The tenant house was purchased by Arnold Plank and moved about two miles up PA Hill to its present location near the Hillside Baptist Church.

Not too far from the McManus Farm, on the Almond side, was the Richtmyer farm.  Tall pine trees mark that spot, in front of which the “corn man” is usually parked in the summertime.  “WJ”, the father of Earl and grandfather of Bill, was described as philanthropic, well liked, and a staunch supporter of the church.  He owned considerable land across the road, extending to a special area of rocky ledges in the Canacadea Creek where he developed a camping area for fresh air children from the city.  Some folks remember a large pavilion-type building located there, others remember great times of picnicking and swimming.  It was told that several tent revival meetings were held at the site, featuring the famous evangelist, Billy Sunday.  Although details are not clear, it is believed that during the Flood of ’35, children camping there were in grave danger and were rescued from the raging waters by Lew and his hired men, who loaded them on his horse-drawn haywagons and took them back to the McManus house.

 Whether the camp continued after that is uncertain, but for several years it remained a place of fun for many families until the dirt road leading to it became overgrown with brush and poplar trees and was finally shut off by new highway guardrails.  The Richtmyer name is also remembered from the grocery store and freezer locker rentals they owned for years at the current site of Loohns’ Cleaners, corner of Seneca and Genesee Streets in Hornell.

It is not known exactly how many homes on the three-mile stretch of Almond Road were actually removed.  But at least five houses were moved into the North Main Street section of Almond, once commonly called “Upper Battery.”  These include the Neff house, now occupied by the Westlakes, the Ewell property where Foxes live, the Kernan house now owned by Crooks, the Straight house rented by Smiths, and the Ken Stuart home.  Ron Coleman remembers the latter building, co-owned by his father, Paul, and Carmen Davis, because he rode on the roof during the move to make sure it got underneath the utility wires.  Its final destination was the asparagus bed of Almond’s master gardeners, Fred Makeley.

Others were moved right on through town, providing lasting memories for those that watched the procession.  Betty Washburn, who has lived in her N Main Street home for 74 years, said, “We had a lot of fun because we sat here on the porch and watched the houses come by on those big trucks.  It was fun to see how they maneuvered them!” Some, like the Ken Crusen home, now occupied by Doug Norton, and the Mensinger home, where Kristi Hurd lives, were on their way to their new sites on the old Whitney Valley Road. 

The destination of several others was South Main Street, known then to villagers as “Hollywood.”

The Dale Patton home was moved from its location on the left side of Almond Road near Lincoln Notch to Nellie MacMichael’s hay field.  Ken Patton, via e-mail, writes this:  “This was a most exciting time for me.  When our house was moved, it took two days after it was jacked up and ready to roll to move it to where it now sits at 124 South Main Street.  It was left in the center of Almond overnight, and I believe it was pulled by a Farmall farm tractor. It was the talk of the town. It isn’t every day someone’s house is sitting “on” Main Street in the middle of town.  It sat across from the park area in town.  People could drive around the park to pass.  There sure wasn’t much room to get past on the south end of town, but in town on the north end they could use Chapel Street.”  Today the Norris family owns the house.

An e-mail inquiry to Louise Newman Schwartz about the Newman home, located on the right side of Almond Road just below the village line, revealed this information: “The original Newman homestead was located just the other side of the road that led to the ‘Red Bridge.’  This house was not moved.  My dad, Charlie, and my Uncle Irwin, (Shorty), tore the house down and used a lot of the lumber to build the two new houses where Betty (Newman)  and Granduskys now live.  On that Newman homestead, my grandfather, Jonathan Newman, once had a cigar business in the early 1900s,” she wrote.  She further explained that after the lumber they wanted had been removed, the men, anxious to get rid of the debris, burned the remainder of the house.  However, her mother, Leola, later found out that some of the contents, including an heirloom crib and her grandmother’s quilts were still in the building – something her mother regrets to this day!

Chapel Street was the new location for the Harold Hanks house, providing a young widow and her family a new home.  Bryde McIntosh Kuhne had been living with her small children, Mary Alice and George, at 45 Main Street, when it was sold to the Dexters.  At the time, there was a housing shortage in the area due to the many veterans returning from World War II.  “I could not find a place that would rent to children, and I was desperate to find a place to live,” she said.  Someone told her that the Hanks house was being taken for the Dam project and she decided to buy it and have it moved.  But the dilemma was where to put it!  “Mary Alice was walking down Chapel Street one day, and came home and told me she had found a place for the house.  Martha Easterbrooks, who lived across the street, owned the lot, which was next to her flower garden.  I hired Ray Hanks and his sons to move the house there and put it back together for us,” she recalls.

Many other houses were moved to various locations in the Hornell-Almond area.  Gladys has a remarkable memory when it comes to where houses originally stood, who owned them, and where they were taken.  When asked to help with this project, she sketched several maps of the roads between Thacherville, PA Hill and Almond prior to the construction, complete with names of owners and indicated their current location or demise.  In 1946, she and her late husband, Don, purchased one of the homes displaced from the dam area and which are now located above Thacherville on the Almond Road.  The four dwellings, once owned by the Castellanas, Albrights, Prestons, and Houghtalings,  now sit side by side and are occupied by Donegans, Masons (formerly Claude Lewis home), Farleys, and  Ordways.

As a child, her father, Floy Preston worked for the Thacher family, who owned most of the land from the Morris Bridge to the gray house (owned by Huff) east of the Beacon Inn.   “There was no Thacherville back then,” she explained.  “That whole area was a large apple orchard next to their big barns.  They sold off lots 49 ½ feet wide and people began to build houses,” she said.  At least three were moved in from the dam:  Cones moved theirs down, Spencers bought the former Conine place and moved it,  and the Smith house was moved through the creek (see photo on page 1). This was necessitated by the fact that it could not be taken over the Goff bridge, due to its high framework and supports.  Others from the dam area were moved even farther down past Wilkins RV next to the former Jimmy’s Supper Club, but none of those building exist there today.

An interesting document entitled “Final Project Ownership Map”, produced by the War Department and loaned to us by Bill Cleveland, shows the entire area prior to the project. More than 125 land parcels are identified with owner’s names, with highways, railroads, streams, power lines, and elevations included in the drawing. The proposed dam is laid out across the center.   Because sections of Route 21 followed alongside the  Canacadea Creek right through the center of the proposed project, several miles of roadway had to be moved to the east.  The railroad tracks were already up on the hill, but there was not enough room for the road, so they had to be moved farther into the hillside.  Lillian Hanks, who worked in Hornell during those years, remembers driving from Almond to Hornell on old Route 21 and looking up on the hill where the railroad tracks were, wondering, “How are they going to put a road way up there?”

(The story of how they did that  -- and more --  will be continued in the AHS newsletter September 2001 issue)

AHS JUNE 2001

ALMOND DAM STORY PART II

WRITTEN BY DONNA B. RYAN

In the June issue of this newsletter, we related stories about the beginnings of the Almond Dam project, necessitated by the ravaging effects of the Flood of 1935. The description of what the area was like before countless homes and businesses were uprooted, moved, or destroyed, brought back many memories and elicited comments and recollections from several readers.

The summer of 1946 was a crucial time for those living where the proposed project was to be built.  A lengthy Evening Tribune article dated April 4, 1946, entitled “Seybold Explains Almond Flood Control Project Before 250 Area Residents at Central School,” begins thus:  “Residents in the working area of the proposed Almond dam must evacuate almost immediately while those living above the site have until closure is effected in the summer of 1948.” 

It goes on:  “Before the visitors departed, each individual present had a clear picture of what the dam, reservoir and channel improvements would mean personally,” as well as technical data on the project itself.  Sponsored by the Almond Civic Club, the article includes a photo of the government officials together with the late Robert Mason (father of Ed and Bob) and John Gilmore, club officers. 

Seybold, a colonel with the Army Corps of Engineers, made these points: “The reservoir, or pool formed by the dam, will extend approximately to the road leading from the Almond highway South to the Erie Railroad tracks, near the village limits.  The relocated highway, which starts East of the Goff Bridge, rejoins the Hornell Almond road near the Richtmyer farm, considerably below the extreme limits of the dam’s pool.

“Asked how often the relocated road would be flooded to prevent travel, the speaker emphasized it was impossible to predict what year this area would experience another flash flood similar to the 1935 disaster.  ‘But when it does come, and it will, I assure you the projects will more than handle the water.  The amount of water that spread its devastation here in 1935 will only half fill the reservoir planned,’ he stated. ” 

He noted that the government was expected to advertise for bids on the $3.5 million project within two weeks, let the contract in another month, and begin actual work in early June.

Two months later, the June 6, 1946 Evening Tribune carried this headline:  “Arrival of Engineers Indicates Almond Dam Contract Will Be Let.”  Although no contract was in place, twelve engineers from the US government, headed by D. E. Mather, resident engineer on the Arkport Dam project in 1936-37, had “occupied one of the evacuated houses below the dam site and plan to take over other abandoned houses for use of federal employees on the project,” the article concluded, indicating that work would probably start that summer.

In spite of the public meeting and the moving in of the engineers, there remained skepticism among some of the local residents, it seemed.  Paulena Crossett Wheeler, who lived with her family on the Burr Carter farm near Hopkins Road, told about her father, Howard’s, reaction:  “Dad wasn’t going to move.  He was going to sit on the porch with his shotgun.  He made no effort to find a place for us to live.  He said, ‘The government isn’t going to get me.’ And he was going to sit right there.  Finally, my mother found the house on Angelica Street where we moved.”   The Carter house was eventually relocated to Almond Village, near the present Municipal Building location, and was used for several years as a youth center before its demise after the 1972 flood. The granary was dismantled and taken to Lake Demmon, where Lewis Wheeler and Leon Hanks rebuilt a summer cottage that the Wheelers still enjoy.

But even thought some residents scoffed, most residents living within the actual dam basin area took it seriously, as related in an Evening Tribune article headed: “Move Houses Across Creek to New Site.”  It reads:  “Noah had his ark and these people have their homes.  And a flood is the cause of both. Residents West of the Goff Bridge, notified they must be out of the construction site for the flood protection check dam almost immediately, are moving one by one to other locations.  But in all cases, owners are not able to traverse the highway to their new locations because their houses are too big to get past the Goff Bridge.  So down the creek bank and across the almost dry bed go the larger houses, returning to the highway on the other side of the bridge.”

The AHS June newsletter showed a photo of the Allen Smith home being pulled across the riverbed to its new location in Thacherville.  “All along both sides of the highway leading from Hornell to Almond can be seen new foundations and other evidence of new population coming nearer the city away from the dam site,” the article concluded.

            Almost eleven years to the day of the disastrous July 8, 1935 flood, details were printed in the Evening Tribune about the $3.3 million contract being awarded to Carlo Bianchi and Company, Inc. of Framingham, MA.   Authorized by Congress in the Flood Control Act of 1936 as protection for the lower valley, including Hornell, Painted Post, and Corning, the proposition had been dormant because of the war, according to the story.

            “The first phase of the project will be cutting away of the hill along the Erie Railroad tracks opposite the Goff Bridge for relocation of the rails and the Hornell-Almond highway.  Goff Bridge will be removed and a new span across the Canacadea Creek will be constructed by the State of New York,” the article explained.

            “The dam proper will be a rolled-fill dam built of compacted earth with a central section of impervious material and outer sections grading from impervious to pervious at the outside for drainage purposes.  The forward face will be carefully rip rapped with heavy stone so that wave-wash will not damage the slopes,” it concluded.

It was difficult to envision how they would accomplish the feat of moving the railroad and highway up on the hillside, but residents soon learned how they were going to do things when Bianchi arrived on the scene with their equipment.  “Their equipment was huge! We were fascinated by the size of them.  I can see the elevator and the loader now – they pulled it with a diesel caterpillar/tractor,” Chub Lockwood exclaimed.  Lew Wheeler agreed, saying, “They brought in a conventional shovel on the train, the biggest one in the East, unloaded it at the depot and brought it up to the site.” Described as a bucket on a dipper stick, Lew explained that the operator would dig up a vast amount of dirt, swing the arm around, and dump it into awaiting trucks and wagons. “Before that, around here the towns had equipment that could only dig 3/8 yard of dirt. But now this bucket could dig 2 ½ yards,” he said.

 “In this area, we had not seen any equipment like that before,” Ron Coleman remembered as he described the “eucs” and “pans” used to scoop and dig dirt as well as level the terrain.  “I remember being very impressed with their operation.  But those drivers would bounce around terribly as they drove those big machines,” he said.

Wendell Taft, who now lives in Cuba, was one of the project employees who went down to help unload the shovel when it came in on the Erie.  “Man oh man, what a huge thing,” he remembers.  “It came in pieces: the dipstick, tracks and body were all separate and had to be transported to the site and reassembled,” he went on.  Earning only slightly more than a dollar an hour, Wendell was grateful for a job, even though he was clearing brush and trees with “a good old axe and cross cut saw,” he said.  “All the guys coming out of the service were in pretty good shape, but we ended up with blisters on our hands and sore backs.  But it beat the $20 that the GI Bill was going to pay us for the next 52 weeks,” he chuckled.  His father-in-law, the late Harold Willey, had worked on heavy equipment at the Arkport Dam construction site, and was the master mechanic on the Almond Dam project.

Victor Stuck of Arkport was very happy when he returned home from the service to find a job with Bianchi operating a huge earthmover called a tournapull.  Describing the contractor as a “beautiful guy,” he said the best part of the job was the pay:  The worst part:  getting in some tight spots – and the dust.

John D’Apice of Hornell was in Schillacci’s Barber Shop on Loder Street one day, concerned about his need for a better job.  Having just returned from World War II, he happened to look out the window and see one of the gigantic machines go by, having just been unloaded at the Erie Depot.  “That’s for me!” he said, and went to find out how to get a job on the Almond Dam project.  He started out as a “euc” driver, hauling gravel and material from the Thacher flats up to the dam area.

But the challenge of driving a tournapull obsessed John.  While the “eucs” simply transported materials, the tournapulls were a much more complex machine.  Consisting of two parts, the front two-wheeled tractor section housed the engine and operator, and was attached to the rear “pan” with an arrangement of lanky hydraulic arms and shafts.  By working a series of hand controls, the driver was able to drop the bottom of the “pan” and scoop up huge amounts of dirt and gravel as they moved along.  Holding an enormous capacity of 12 ½ yards, it was necessary for a dozer (“snatchcat”) to be attached to the front of the rig, providing additional power for the job.

 “Every day I watched the guys operating the tournapulls,” John remembered.  He went on to tell that when they stopped for lunch, he watched where they parked their equipment.  “One day I went over to one of the drivers and asked him if I could take the rig out for a ‘run.’  He let me take it, and the boss came around, wondering who was out working during the lunch hour.  ‘Who is driving that rig??’ he asked, and the guys said, ‘D’Apice.’  He waved me down and said, ‘You want to break your neck, eh? Tomorrow morning you are going to start learning to operate the tournapull,’”  John declared.

Nicknaming the device a “mankiller,” he explained that the Army surplus equipment had a complicated operating system consisting of two foot-operated throttles, two hand-operated steering clutches, as well as foot brakes and hand brakes on the back of the steering clutches. Two additional levers were used to pick up the pan after a load and dump it at whatever height the foreman requested. “It was real tough to steer, and our hands were busy all the time” he explained, “We always referred to them as ‘she’, because it took a long time to learn how to operate it, and we never knew what it was going to do,” he laughed.  Making the job even more difficult was the fact that traffic was still moving on Route 36 between Hornell and Almond while a lot of the construction was taking place. 

Termed a “very dangerous job”, one of the incentives for the drivers was the pay:  John started out at $1.10 as a “euc” driver, then began at $1.75 on the tournapull, with his pay increasing to $2.75 per hour.  Sixty-hour workweeks provided the workers with excellent wages at that time. 

In spite of the fact that the huge contraption tipped over twice with him, John still is enthusiastic about his career as a heavy equipment operator.  “I loved it,” he said.  “I loved watching a mountain disappear and take a different shape.  When the dam was finished, three of us took the rigs all the way to the Adirondacks to another project site – a three-day trip, ” he recalled. 

Another vet back from the war, Ed Rawady, was also looking for a job.  One day someone told him, “They need some carpenters up at the dam, and they are paying $1.75 an hour. I didn’t walk – I ran up to find out about it.  I was no carpenter – I had pounded a few nails, but that was it!  I really put out the effort on the job. We had no power tools at all, just hand tools.  There was no plywood, and we built concrete forms from tongue and grove boards with hand saws, planes, hammers, squares and levels,” he recalled. 

“It was a fun trip,” he explained.  “The war was over, and the pressure was off. Things were good.  People had money to spend, because they weren’t able to buy a lot of things during the war, and they had saved through war bonds,” he said.  “It was also an interesting project,” he went on.  “How many carpenters get to build a dam?”

An e-mail from Dave Ferry, son of the late Hiram Ferry of the Bishopville Rd, now living in St. Louis, tells of his experiences:  “I worked on the Almond Dam for two summers with the US Engineer Corps as a rod man on their survey crew.  The crew’s job was to check out all the work done by the contractors and their surveyors to make sure all their work met specifications, and that the right materials were used in the right places, ” he explained.

He also called it a “fun job”, and one that he was fortunate to land the summer of 1947 upon his discharge from the US Army.  However, he explains that he had no knowledge of surveying when he started.  “I remember the first day on the job, when they handed me this ‘rod’, which was calibrated in feet and inches.  This is the device the transit looks at to read the elevation.  They told me to go over on the foundation (where one of the houses had been) and get on the bench.  They thought I knew what I was doing.  As I walked over to this location, I kept wondering why anyone would want to sit on a bench out in the middle of nowhere.  I found no such bench.  When I walked back and told them I couldn’t find a bench to sit on in the area, they had a big laugh.  They thought I knew what I was doing when I was hired!  So they had to train me from the beginning.  I found out that a bench is a benchmark, a permanent point of some kind that has the exact reading of that elevation above sea level.  This is the point that a survey has to start from to determine the elevations of the surrounding area.  I found out later that the reason I got the job without experience was because of a letter sent by one of my references, Mr. (John) Gilmore, principal at Alfred-Almond.  His letter said such good things about me, they hired me without experience. I guess Mr. Gilmore didn’t really know me very well,” he joked.

He went on to explain:  “There were jobs with high priorities, such as immediately checking the forms for pouring concrete after the construction surveyors had approved them.  There were other jobs that had to be done on a routine basis such as checking the types of fill as the dam went up.  Then there were other jobs that could be done as there was time, such as surveying the final levels on both sides of the dam for permanent records.  We also checked the elevations every 50-ft or so from  the dam from one end to the other, up stream and down stream which often meant wading the stream and taking elevations on the bottom of that too. We had no pagers, no cell phones, but there was a routine that worked and got the job done.  And, when we were caught up with nothing pressing, then we headed for berry picking and naptime in the woods.  Didn't happen often, but there were times.  It was usually towards the end of the day or on a Saturday afternoon!”

 “We worked ten hours a day, six days a week, much of the time trying to keep up with all the various construction going on at one time.  There were five of us on the crew and we rode around in a classy wood-paneled Ford Station wagon to the various sites.  If we got behind it meant construction was held up until we could get to the location to check out the process.  The pay was good and I actually got a raise when I started my second summer.  Whenever I’m back in the area and drive down the road by the dam, it brings back a lot of good memories of the guys I worked with back then,” he closed.

A great deal of the undertaking was labor intensive and afforded young men an employment opportunity during their college years.  Gene Allen worked two years while a student at Alfred. “The first summer, I broke up rocks with a maul.  They would bring in a load of fill, and the rocks had to be broken up – by hand!  The next summer, I was on the concrete gang, putting grout in the tunnel and constructing the spillway.  We had big concrete pours: 500 yards a day.  That was a LOT of concrete, and we worked, rain or shine.  They would pump a load of concrete into the forms and we had to work it with electric vibrators, bringing the concrete pile down, smoothing it out, and breaking up the air pockets.  If there were any air pockets in the concrete, the inspectors would not pass the work.  On a rainy day when a big pour was happening, events got a little more exciting when a man would grab the wrong part of the vibrator and experience unexpected shocks,” he laughed.  “Four or five of my buddies worked there, and it made work fun.  They paid us good money for those days, too.  I might have made $1.10 an hour!”

Dick Harrington, along with others, explained that the heavy rocks laid to protect the face of the dam from wave-wash were quarried north of Bishopville, in Klipnocky, and transported to the site independent contractor’s trucks.  Although Dick did not work on the Almond Dam project, he was on the crew that “harvested” the rip-rap from the Klipnocky site for the Arkport Dam project ten years earlier.  It was hard work – with no forklifts, cranes or loaders for assistance, and the only equipment the laborers used were mauls and shovels.   “They would blast with dynamite to shake the rocks loose,” Dick explained, and then the laborers would break them up by hand. The rocks were then picked up by a cable-operated shovel, dropped onto an angle-iron grid, which sorted out the dirt and small rocks and dumped onto awaiting trucks. 

“Things were different then,” Dick stressed.  “There was no OSHA, and no hard hats.  If you smashed your finger, they said ‘go home and fix it.’  The rock haulers used old beat up trucks – they’d never buy a new truck for that job.   Probably most of them didn’t have brakes – they’d just shift down and pray – and there were no NYS inspection laws,” he said.

The late Clint Gillette, who owned Gillette’s Garage on Main Street next to the hardware, was described as the leading “mobile welder” whose good equipment and expertise kept indispensable machinery and vehicles functioning. His son, Bud, recalls that one of the subcontractors “had a bunch of old machinery, and Dad did a lot of work on welding trucks and cranes to keep them running.  Some of the vehicles were chain-driven like a motorcycle, with a rear end differential,” he noted, adding that his dad’s ability to fix and repair anything was eagerly sought after by the equipment owners.

Other local business owners benefited from the construction project, including the Almond Hardware where Phil MacMichael worked for his uncle, Millard Wilson.  The building, razed during the construction of the access road for Route 17, was located on the corner of Karrdale Avenue and Main Street.  “We got to know lots of the workers and some of the contractors on the project who often stopped at the store for supplies.  Mr. Baldwin was a contractor who moved several of the houses.  We also did the plumbing in the caretaker’s house on the top of the dam. . .. a very nice house,” he reported.

Even the kids got into the entrepreneurial mode, seeing an opportunity make a little money, according to Gladys Farley.  Living just outside of Thacherville, she remembers them being awakened in the morning to the roar of pans and “eucs” moving dirt across the road.  “Floyd and the girls bought pop from Bud McCarthy and brought it up here to our yard.  They put it on ice in washtubs, set up a little stand, and sold it to the dam workers,” she said.

After nearly three years, the project was finally completed in 1949.  “It was a very good project because of the flood protection,” Bill Cleveland, head dam operator, states.  “The misconception of Almond residents is that we have an effect on Almond when the water is being backed up in the dam.  They think we are backing up floodwaters to protect Hornell, which is true. But it has no effect on Almond, whatsoever.  All of our water back up is below any Almond property levels.  When our water is at spillway capacity (the maximum amount of water the dam can hold) it backs up into the Canacadea Creek only within the creek banks. All Almond private properties are above elevation of the dam if completely filled with water,” he explained.

Bill’s job as a federal government representative for the past 21 years is to operate and maintain both the Arkport and Almond dams.  In addition to opening and closing the floodgates, he and his crew maintain the lake, fix and repair equipment, keep up the buildings, and are the public relations reps for the Dam.

Although the gates were closed and the basin was filled with water to the point of going over Route 21 many times, the first big test of the dam came more than twenty years after its completion.  The effects of Hurricane Agnes in June, 1972, resulted in a massive flood that hit the entire area.  The water came to within nine inches of going over the emergency spillway, and the dam held “beautifully,” according to reports in the

Evening Tribune.  Since then, there have been other floods and the dam has withstood these tests as well.

Bill explained that the entire project is inspected and scrutinized every five years by a team of professional geologists, electricians and hydraulic engineers.  “This concrete has hardly shown any kind of deterioration.   It was built with technology from the 40’s, and was actually overbuilt.  There is no wear – it is amazing,” he stated proudly.

That is very comforting to those folks who depend upon the dam for their protection.  In 1946, some skeptics said,  “There won’t be enough water in that dam to wash your feet or take a bath!”  But in truth, there has been a lot of water in that dam many times since then. It has been, and will continue to be, the salvation of life and property for those living downstream for a long time to come – thanks to those who relinquished their properties and those who were grateful for a job and willing to work hard to build it more than fifty years ago!

Copyright © 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010  Ronald G. Taylor All rights reserved.