Description

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Civilian Conservation Corps (C.C.C.) combined efforts to construct the Waterbury Dam in Waterbury, Vermont during the Great Depression.

On November 3 and 4, 1927, torrential rains created a disastrous flood that paralyzed Vermont. Little River’s rising waters drove the valley residents to their roofs and isolated the hillside farmers. Fifty-five people in the Winooski Valley (beside Route 2) lost their lives, and property damage was estimated at $13,500,000. A second flood in 1934 spurred the construction of Waterbury Dam. Construction of the project began in April 1935 and was completed in October 1938 by five thousand men of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the CCC. A power plant was added in 1956. The project consists of an earth fill dam with stone slope protection 1,845 feet long and 187 feet high.

Nearby, at todays Little River Camp is the remains of the former CCC camp that operated from 1933 to 1939 and when fully operating, had more than 80 buildings, and housed 2,000 men at its peak. CCC enrollees worked on both the dam and the Mt. Mansfield State Park, which includes an abandoned late 19th century farming community and farm houses that date back to the 1700’s on Cotton Brook on the north end of the reservoir.