Project Aims To Uncover What's Under Wachusett Reservoir, Dam

CLINTON, MA — Even though it holds 65 billion gallons of water, covers 7 square miles and touches four towns, the Wachusett Reservoir — the state's second-largest body of water — is easy to overlook.

All that water covers countless stories about how the the reservoir was built, and about the people who either lived near or worked on the structure more than 120 years ago.

But now a retired engineer and Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) professor is building the first ever online, multimedia history of the reservoir and dam to expose what's under all those billions of gallons.

Paul Marrone began the "Before There Was A Dam" project three years ago using historical photos kept by Digital Commonwealth, the state's online history archive. Combined with his training as a construction engineer — and some help from his WPI students — he's been able to unravel the mechanics undergirding the reservoir and dam, and reconstruct the lives of local residents and workers who lived through the construction.

"I can look at photos and use my experience to interpret them," he said. "I can tell you how the trains worked, how the cranes worked, what the bricklayers were doing."

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The work is similar to a puzzle. Marrone finds small clues in images like trees and buildings to assemble the images chronologically. In one instance, he found a picture of the first rock used to build the Clinton dam. He's pinpointed where it's buried 80 feet below where the structure rises from the soil.

In some cases, Marrone has been able to create videos to illustrate how the construction happened. He and his students recently created a 3D animation showing how workers used a system of wooden towers and cables to hoist massive rocks into place to lay the foundation of the Clinton dam.

There are also plenty of human stories under the water. Marrone, who grew up in Clinton, noticed a pine tree in some early photos — the same one in his mother and father's wedding photo. He's also been able to put names to some of the people who once lived on farms at what is now the bottom of the reservoir (one mind-numbing detail: six square miles of top soil had to be cleared off those farms by hand due to concerns the dirt would clog the dam).

Perhaps the most surprising discovery Marrone has made: the dam and reservoir would be built pretty much the same way today, just using bulldozers instead of horses. He calls the engineering behind the dam "perfect," and said even an earthquake would have trouble cracking the 200-foot-tall structure.

Marrone, who is 74, updates the website frequently with new stories about pieces of the project. And there's a lot more to come. He guesses he'll be working "until the end."

"It'll be a comprehensive project," he said.