A brief notice of the State Dam and Great Boom, just mentioned, seems necessary.

The dam was about two and a-half miles above Glen's Falls. It had been constructed about fifteen years before, to furnish water for the feeder of the canal which connects the Hudson river and Lake Champlain. It was sixteen hundred feet in length ; and the mills near it have attracted a population sufiicicnt to constitute quite a \illage, named State Dam. About two miles above this dyke was the Great Boom, thrown across the river for the purpose of catching all the logs that come floating from above. It was made of heavy, hewn timbers, four of them bolted together

THE HUDSON.

raft- wise. The ends of the groups were conuected by chains, which worked over friction rollers, to allow the boom to accommodate itself to the motion of the water. Each end of the boom was secured to a heavy abutment by chains ; and above it were strong triangular structures to break the ice, to serve as anchors for the boom, and to opeiate as shields to prevent the logs striking the boom with the full speed of the current. At times, immense numbers of logs were collected above this boom, tilling the river for two or three miles. In the spring of 1859, at least half a million of logs were collected there, ready to be taken into small side-

$;c^^^^^^tT^^m

THE gki;at boom.

booms, assorted by the owners according to their private murks, and seut down to Glen's Falls, Sandy Hill, or Fort Edward, to be sawed into boards at the former places, or made into rafts at the latter, for a voyage down the river. Heavy rains and melting snows filled the river to overflowing. The great boom snapped asunder, and the half million of logs went rushing down the stream, defying every barrier.