The Austin Dam, also known as the Bayless Dam, was a concrete gravity dam in the Austin, Pennsylvania, area that served the Bayless Pulp and Paper Mill. Built in 1909, it was the largest dam of its type in Pennsylvania at the time. The catastrophic failure of the dam on September 30, 1911, caused significant destruction and loss of life in Freeman Run Valley below the dam.

History

In 1900, George Bayless, owner of Bayless Paper, built a paper mill in the Freeman Run Valley. By 1909, the company realized that occasional dry seasons required a more reliable water source. After finding a small earthen dam to be inadequate, the T. Chalkey Hatton firm was commissioned to build a large concrete gravity dam across the valley. The dam was high and long, and cost $86,000 to construct, (nearly $3,000,000 today adjusted for inflation). Because it was deemed too expensive, an underground vertical concrete slab, which had been designed to prevent water seeping under the dam through the soil on which the dam sat, was not built, on Bayless's orders. At the time, Pennsylvania had no state regulations or requirements about the building of dams.

The inhabitants of the town of Austin, Pennsylvania, downstream from the dam, referred to it, with Bayless's encouragement, as "The dam that could not break." The site was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987.

  • An earlier documentary about the dam failure, simply titled Austin Flood, was filmed likely on the very next day by the Thanhouser Company, and released as early as October 6, 1911; it consisted in 750 feet of film, showing “the suffering, horror and devastation wrought by the flood”.
  • This is likely the dam failure graphically depicted by Margaret Sutton in her Judy Bolton novel.

References

  • Austin (Bayless) Dam failure case study at the Association of State Dam Safety Officials