Long Lake Dam
Long Lake Dam
In 1907, the St. John Lumber Company began construction
on the Long Lake Dam and, after the first effort washed out
in its first season, completed the project in 1911. This timber
crib structure was made up of huge pine logs and cost a total
of $50,000 and extended the duration of the company's log
drive northward down the Allagash River. The dam was seven
hundred feet across, held fifteen feet of water depth, and
each of its eighteen gates were eight feet wide. When the
gates were opened, the force was felt more than one hundred
miles away at Van Buren. When the east side of the first dam
collapsed in 1908, the water level at Fort
Kent rose several feet.
The dam gave the lumber company better control of water flow
down the Allagash River and added ten days to the drive. In
better years, it was refilled three and four times during
a single summer. It was so effective in the 1910s and 1920s
that the dam was credited with stabilizing the economy of
the upper St. John basin.
During the winter of 1926-27, Edouard "King" Lacroix
had the Long Lake Dam remodeled, raising the head to seventeen
feet and removing some of the shore gates.
Long Lake Dam was built in 1907 by the St. John Lumber Company
to facilitate log driving in late spring and early summer.
The original dam was 700 feet long and held a fifteen-foot
head of water. Its use was discontinued in the 1920s. Today,
the dam is almost completely washed out. Remnants of dump
wagons used to haul gravel for construction of the dam are
scattered in the nearby forest and in the watercourse below
the dam.
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