How old is the Orland Village Dam?

The current Orland Village Dam was built in the 1930s by the Maine Seaboard Paper Company to create a water supply for the paper mill in Bucksport; however, it was never used for this purpose, as Alamoosook Lake proved to be a more efficient alternative. The dam is located at the head of tide, and replaced older dams (see photo below from 1910) across what historically had been called the “Lower Falls.”

The falls powered sawmills in the late 1700s. The falls must have been large enough to prevent ship traffic, because in December 1816 the Massachusetts Legislature incorporated the Eastern River Lock & Sluice Company to move vessels and goods over the falls. Company owners John N. Swazey, Joseph R. Folsom, and Joseph Lee constructed a series of locks at Lower Falls shortly afterwards, enabling navigation to their mills near the outlet of “Great Pond” or Alamoosook Lake. The company could thus charge a toll for moving boards, planks, bark, timber, clapboards, shingles, etc. through the locks to the Penobscot waterfront. They were allowed to make a sluice and lock or locks “from the outlet of Eastern River Great Pond, so called, to the waters below the falls, at the head of the tide in the town of Orland” and to erect a dam, provided that their activity did not interfere with an 1814 law protecting fish passage. An 1825 Maine law reinforced the fish passage requirement.

In 1869, Walter Wells noted in his report, Water-Power of Maine that the river fell 15-16 feet from the outlet of Alamoosook to the “stone dam at tidewater.” “The dam at the head of tide is substantially built of granite, head and fall 10 feet, ponding the water back two miles to the Great pond dam; saw, grist, and stave mills.”

Archaeologist Warren Moorehead, who investigated ancient Wabanaki “red paint” cemeteries in 1912, wrote of Orland: “At Orland we found the Narramissic flowing in a picturesque little valley. There is a dam here which furnishes power for a saw mill and a grist mill. Above the dam the water is fresh; below, it is salt, and small schooners tie up at the wharf below the dam. In Indian times there were falls two or three meters in height where the dam is now located. On either side of the stream at this point there are high, steep hills, as the river has cut out a miniature gorge on its passage to the Penobscot. The banks flanking these hills were favorite resorts for aboriginal fishing parties…” 

References

Moorehead, W.K. 1922. A Report on the Archaeology of Maine. Andover, MA: The Andover Press.

State of Maine. 1825. Private Acts of the State of Maine, Passed by the Fifth Legislature, at its Session Held in January, 1825. Portland: Todd and Smith. 

State of Massachusetts. 1816. Laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Boston: Russell, Cutler & Co.

Wells, W. 1869. The Water-Power of Maine. Augusta: Sprague, Owen & Nash.