Great Falls

Here are three anecdotes about the Great Falls on the Amesville-Falls Village border, my research prompted by the removal of the 1903 through-truss bridge to make way for a new span.

The first bridge erected across the Housatonic River at this spot is said to have been a wooden structure put up here in 1744. It was called Burrall’s Bridge, according to the 1881 “History of Litchfield County.”

The just-cut-up bridge was erected by Berlin Iron Bridge Co. of East Berlin, Conn. The firm, which began life as Corrugated Metal Co., specialized in building metal bridges after it acquired William Douglas’s patent using a parabolic design. What’s a parabolic design? The nickname was pumpkinseed. The trusses were squatty ovals with pointy ends that sat atop metal pedestals. 

The Falls Village bridge was of a later and rather mundane design. Its trusses were angular. But you can find parabolic Berlins at Lover’s Leap and Boardman’s in New Milford and at Sharon Station Road in Sharon, though the old trusses on the last one are just railings now.

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The Housatonic River roars at the Great Falls, as you know, and poses a danger to anyone on the river who is incautious.

During the spring freshet in 1837, the Litchfield history tells us, “Two of the men employed by Mr. [Horatio] Ames at his iron-works attempted to cross the river in a boat; such was the force of the current that they were precipitated over the cataract. One of them, David O’Neal, an Irish laborer, was killed; the other, Walter Holley, almost miraculously escaped with little injury.”

Sounds like a scene from a movie.

As a matter of fact, “The falls at Falls Village have been discovered by the moving picture people,” The Berkshire Courier in Great Barrington reported in 1915. “A few days ago the locality was the scene of a ‘thrilling rescue.’ A boat with a couple of children in it was sent down the river near the falls. Before the falls were reached a woman in another boat rescued the children and the first boat went over the falls empty, all of which was duly photographed and undoubtedly will appear on the film later as a hair-breadth escape. The falls are a beautiful sight just now, as there is much more water in the river than is usual at this time of the year.”

The writer had no success in identifying the silent movie. It would be fun to see.