Passaic Falls Bridge 1870
Paterson, New Jersey: 1870. Albumen silver print. 10 11/16 x 16 3/16 inches.
The first iron, and fourth bridge to cross the Chasm was placed there July 2, 1868, was eighty-five feet long and was built by the Watson Machine Company, builders of the Post Patent bridges.
E. M. Graff, Passaic County Historical Society Publication, October 1944.
The river was highly significant in the early industrial development of New Jersey. It provided a navigable route connected by canals to the Delaware River starting in the late 18th century.
It also was an early source of hydropower at the Great Falls of the Passaic in Paterson, resulting in the early emergence of the area as the center of industrial mills.
"The Great Falls: Power for Another Revolution?" Jacqueline Mroz; The New York Times, March 27, 2009.
More than 200 years ago, during the Revolutionary War, Alexander Hamilton was traveling with General George Washington when the men stopped with their entourage to have a meal in front of a magnificent waterfall. As they ate and drank, the precocious 23-year-old Hamilton saw in the power of the falls an engine of post-Colonial development for the nascent nation.
These Great Falls, as they are called now, plunge 77 feet over a shelf of basalt. They are a natural wonder in New Jersey but one about which most residents remain completely ignorant.
For decades, these falls, the largest ones in the Northeast after Niagara Falls, powered manufacturing plants here to create the cradle of the industrial revolution in an America trying to become less dependent on British manufacturers. "When Alexander Hamilton founded Paterson, his dream was to harness the power of the falls through a water raceway system and make the city one of the most important industrial centers in the country. And for a time it was, with the raceways driving silk mills and, later, factories for locomotive parts."
Condition: Very good +.
Item number: 93
Price: $200.00
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