Illustrations of the Croton Aqueduct

by F. B. Tower

The outside walls are constructed with openings in them so that by entering the door on 42nd street one may walk entirely around the Reservoir within the walls. One object of this arrangement is to obtain the greatest breadth with a given quantity of material; another is to afford an opportunity to examine the work so as to guard against leakage; and another, to prevent any moisture finding its way through to the exterior so as to cause injury to the wall by the action of frost. This kind of open work of the wall rises to within about 8 feet of top water line. Inside of these walls an embankment of puddled earth is formed with suitable breadth of base to give security to the work, and the face of this earth next to the water is covered with a wall of hydraulic masonry 1¼ foot thick. The top of the embankment is covered with stone flagging, forming a walk around the top of the Reservoir. The bottom of the Reservoir has a covering of concrete 1 foot thick; thus when it is empty there will be seen two basins having the sides and bottom formed of masonry.

A section of the wall of one side of the Reservoir, including the embankment, is 17 feet wide at the top, 35 feet wide 16 feet below the top, and 76 feet wide at the bottom: the cornice projects on the outside and the coping on the inside so as to make the width of the top 21 feet. An iron railing bounds the outside and inside of the walk around the top.

The outside of the Reservoir is built on a slope of one sixth its height, or two inches to the foot, and an Egyptian cornice projects at the top of the main walls and the pilasters.

At the entrance on the 5th Avenue a stairway leads up to the top of the Reservoir.

Terraces are built around at the foot of the walls and covered with grass, giving a rich finish to the work.

This Reservoir may be considered the termination of the Croton Aqueduct, and is distant from the Fountain Reservoir on the Croton, forty and a half miles.

The whole cost of the work, exclusive of the pipes in the city below the Distributing Reservoir, is about 9,000,000 dollars. Adding to this the cost of pipes and arrangements for distributing the water in the city, will make the total cost of supplying the city of New-York with water about 12,000,000 dollars.[7]

The water was introduced into the Distributing Reservoir on the 4th of July, 1842, and the event was hailed by the citizens of New-York with an interest scarcely less than that pervading the whole American people at the remembrance of the event, the anniversary of which, was on that day celebrated.

At an hour when the firing of guns and the ringing of bells had aroused but few from their slumbers, and ere the rays of the morning sun had gilded the city domes, the waters of the Croton gushed up into the Reservoir and wandered about its bottom as if to examine the magnificent structure; or to find a resting place in the temple towards which they had made a pilgrimage.

The national flag floated out from each corner of the Reservoir, and during the day thousands of the citizens visited it giving demonstrations of joy and satisfaction at the accomplishment of this great work.