Down the Susquehanna to the Chesapeake
As the largest river on the East Coast of the United States, the Susquehanna River is the indispensable tributary of the Chesapeake Bay, the nation's largest estuary. Gathering strength from thousands of streams along its 444-mile journey, the river delivers half of the freshwater the bay requires to maintain its ecological balance. Down the Susquehanna to the Chesapeake traces the course of the Susquehanna through New York, Pennsylvania, and Maryland to the bay. Fifty-six short chapters...
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As the largest river on the East Coast of the United States, the Susquehanna River is the indispensable tributary of the Chesapeake Bay, the nation's largest estuary. Gathering strength from thousands of streams along its 444-mile journey, the river delivers half of the freshwater the bay requires to maintain its ecological balance. Down the Susquehanna to the Chesapeake traces the course of the Susquehanna through New York, Pennsylvania, and Maryland to the bay. Fifty-six short chapters discuss key locations along the route and how the river changes from sources to sea. These chapters also look at how natural resources influence, and in some ways shape, the lives of the people and their communities. Along the river tour, Jack Brubaker examines the natural and human history of the Susquehanna, exploring how the river has been used and abused, as well as its current condition and future prospects. He explains how the unusually shallow, rocky river has substantially altered its drainage pattern over geologic time and how it continues to cut channels while erasing and creating islands. For generations the Susquehanna has run through the daily lives of the riverside residents, providing water to drink and a place to pump sewage. Floods have humbled those who chose to live close to the river's edge, and droughts have fretted farmers. A vibrant fishery has provided sustenance and recreation for hundreds of thousands. The Iroquois and the Susquehannocks reluctantly yielded the river to white settlers in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when the Susquehanna defined the American frontier. Coal mining, lumbering, and hydroelectric and nuclear energy production polluted the water and nearly ruined the landscape beyond hope in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Hope returned in the latter part of the last century as the people of the Susquehanna watershed began restoration efforts. With the aid of more than 70 maps and illustrations, Down the Susquehanna to the Chesapeake provides a bold new look at a dynamic old river. This powerful journey brings alive the Susquehanna, its history, and the colorful personalities who live along its banks.
Down the Susquehanna to the Chesapeake\ \ \ By Jack Brubaker\ \ The Pennsylvania State University Press\ Copyright © 2002 The Pennsylvania State University.\ All rights reserved.\ ISBN: 0271021845\ \ \ \ \ Chapter One\ \ \ Spring-Water River\ \ \ Ocquionis Creek\ \ \ I stood in that meadow with sun reflecting back from the isolated drops of water and realized that for a river like the Susquehanna there could be no beginning. It was simply there, the indefinable river, now broad, now narrow, in this age turbulent, in that asleep, becoming a formidable stream and then a spacious bay and then the ocean itself, an unbroken chain with all parts so interrelated that it will exist forever, even during the next age of ice.\ —Thomas Applegarth upon reaching a source of the\ Susquehanna in James Michener's Chesapeake
Prologue: Pine CreekixSpring-Water RiverOcquionis Creek1Lake Otsego4The Outlet11The Course17Cooperstown19Goodyear Lake23Long Crooked RiverGreat Bend27Binghamton31Rockbottom Dam36Owego38Tioga42Wyalusing Rocks46Wyoming Valley50Wilkes-Barre: Coal56Wilkes-Barre: Flood60Nescopeck Falls69Bloomsburg73Long Reach RiverThe Headspring79Bakerton Reservoir81Barnesboro83Canoe Place87Clearfield90Kettle Creek97Lock Haven100Great Island103Williamsport107Muncy112Broad, Shallow RiverThe Confluence119Shamokin Riffles125Port Treverton127Millersburg130Juniata River136Harrisburg: Water Gaps140Harrisburg: Renewal143Harrisburg: Ice148Harrisburg: Drought152Royalton156Three Mile Island161Conewago Falls: Geology167Conewago Falls: Navigation171York Haven175Brunner Island178Marietta182Columbia187Columbia Dam192Rock RiverTurkey Hill199Lake Clarke205Safe Harbor208Conestoga River211Conowingo Pond216Conowingo Dam221Smith's Falls226Great Bay RiverHavre de Grace231The Mouth236The Flats238The Bay243Epilogue: The Sea247An Afterword of Gratitude249A Note on Sources251Notes253Index265
