Ground Water in the Norwalk, Suffield, and Glastonbury Areas, Connecticut

10 CO 30 40 30 Fed. Feet. Feet. Inches. Galls. 16 125 71 110 75 189 200 400 150 503 425 4S 0 30 14 13 16 15 20 20 6 6 0 6 6 5 2 15 3 Si- Slight. 26 (a) 26 50 IS Ernest BaHhol do gneiss. For analysis see p. 71. 20 Saraii F. Leeson do. 21 F. M. Smith. do 23 32 W. R.S.Bates John A. Weed do do 35 C. W. Maary Fordfleld estate Soldiers' Home do.... do Plateau Hill s 38 40 40A ■■■■-■ 12 15 15 (0 6 S s (0. 42 Forbes Slope do 43 Henry D. Weed 175 6.5 75 67 (/) 110 264 350 1,465 1.000 200 700 130 230 500 350 460 450 66i 78 75 153 103 410 128 93J 327 2 J 44 do •5 45 Plain Island do 46 47 W. M. Weed Johan. Shipv/ay... 2 15 Slightly brack- ish. 48 62 Eliza Blcdsell... Fred Wecke Slope do 13 17 13 20 0 6 34 4 14 3 Dry. 55 Vv'm. Ziegler,jr do 56 .....do.. Island 56A do.g 56B .....do.fi 1 57 do Island Slope do 25 25 25 25 25 25 75 70 75 60 60 40 65 50 15 Do. 58 JofinCort H. C. Fleitmau 0 5 20 20 59 9 61 filA Ivlrs. H. P. Stokes... do do .....do.... A. B. Noxon Henry Brencher Caroline E. Perrj' . . . Eidge do do .do Slope do do... 20 15 6 6 6 6 6 0 0 6 6 0 6 G oh 6 10 Dry. 2 10 3^ 0 8 2 20 (0. OIC 63 64 65 20 9 IS 9 6 2 5 20 5 9 ....... 15 60 20 15 20 18 10 10 ('). 68 L. J. Mead do... . 69 Miss Zada Dean . . do . 70 73 Dr. J. F. Pentecost. C. D. Albrecht do do ("O. 74 Mrs. S. C. Petty . do 7S Fred H. Eoryan Plain « Abundant. & For further descriptiorn sec U. S. Geol. Survey Water-Sunply Paper 232, p. 90, 1909. c Op. cit.,p. 91. <^ Water potable, though slightly brackish. e Salt water, although 500 feet from shoi-e. f Four drilled wells on this island. Two were drilled to between 75 and 100 feet deep, where the drills yyere blocked by slanting fissures. The other wells p.re about 200 feet deep and yield salty water. g Wellis loOfeet west of well No. 56. ti Wellis 300 feet northwest of well No. £6. s" Dri.ne.dln 1902; yielded 10 gallons a minute of fair water at first. The yield soon dropped to 4^ gallons a minute, and in four years to 3i gallons a minute; 175 feet from shore. /Drilledin 1904; 150 feet southwest of well No. 61 and 125 feet from shore. Water is salty. K Yielded 18 gallons a minute at a deptli of 360 feet at first, but after four months it failed. Deepening to 4.60 feet gave a yield of 1 or 2 gallons. Seventy-five pounds of 70 per cent dynamite was exploded at the bottom of the well, but v,-ith no effect. A second shot of 50 pounds brought a yield of 10 gallons a minute. This water was fresh at first, but later beeame brackish. Well is 220 feet south of well No. 61. i Well is 175 feet from shore and 100 feet south of well No. 61. 13 Well yields 1% gallons a minute at depth of 75 feet; 5 to 6 at deoth of 150 feet; 7i atdepthof 200 feet: and 8 to 10 at full depth of 410 feet. NEW CANAAN. AREA, POPULATIOX, AND INDUSTRIES. New Canaan, in Fairfield County, Conn., is one of the second tier of towns nortli of Long Island Sound. To the north is part of Westchester County, N. Y., on the w^est is the north part of Stam- ford, on the south is Darien, on the southeast Norwalk, and on the NEW CAN^sAjS'. <«> east Wilton. Silverinine Brook fonns part of the eastern boundary :nul liippowani River part of the western boundary. The total area ol" the town is 2o square miles, oi which 11 square miles, or 1-5 per cent, is wooded. The woods are for the most part in the valleys and on the steep slopes, whereas the broad hilltops and ridge crests are cleared. The territory which now constitutes New Canaan was taken from Stnmford nnd Norwalk in 1801 and incoriwrated as a separate town. Tw population in 1910 was 3,667. an increase of 701 from 1900. The boroufih of New Canaan had about 1,672 inhabitants. Th.e density of population of the town as a whole was 180 to tlie square nTile. The following table shows the population at each census and the per- centasje of change in the decade preceding: roi>ukitioii of -V«r CuHariH. h^lO-lUlO." Year. Pop-ala- tion. Percent ! of change. Year. Popula- tion. Per cent ofcliango. 1,59V 1,689 1S70 2,479 2,673 2,701 2,96S 3,667 -10 + 6 ISSO + 7 1,830 : + 8 2,217 +21 2,600 +17 2,771 + 7 1S90 - + 1 ini'io + 10 WlO + 24 1S60 a Conneetieut Register and Manual, 1919, p. 639. There has been growth in every decade except that from i860 to 1870, when there was a decrease for which no explanation is appar- ent. The large increase from 1830 to 18,50 may be due in part to the opening of the New York & New Haven Railroad in 1819. The increase from 1890 to 1910 is presumably the result of the develop- ment of this region as a commuting residential district tributary to New York City. It is probable that this growth will continue, especially if a proposed railroad from Greenwich through the north i:)art of Stamford and New Canaan to Ridgefield and Danbury is constructed. At all events such a possibility must be borne in mind in planning future development and utilization of the ground and surface water resources of tlie region. The only built-up settlement in New^ Canaan is the borough of New Canaan, incorporated in 1889. There is about 70 miles of road in the town, which is in general well kept up. and there is a good deal of tar-bound macadam. New Canaan is reached by the electri- fied New Canaan branch of the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad, which joins the main line at Stamford. Stages run be- tween New Canaan and Norwalk. There is a post office at the borough, and rural-delivery routes serve the outlying parts of the 76 GEOUND WATER IN NOKWALK AND OTHEE AREAS, CONN. town. The principal industries are agriculture, the raising of nurs- ery stock, and the manufacture of shirts and overalls and of wire goods. SURFACE FEATURES. New Canaan lies on an upland which is dissected by valleys 150 to 200 feet deep that lead south-southwestward. The interstream spaces are broad ridges with gently rolling crests and steep flanks. The profile in figure 14 is drawn across the town a little north of the borough and shows the broad plateau cut b}?" the shallow valley of Fivernile Eiver. and bounded by the deeper valleys of Rippowam and Silvermine River. Formerly the surface was nearly level, but it has been tilted to the south-southeast. This tilting has established tlie general south-southeast courses of the rivers. Tributaries of Rippowam River drain about 5 square miles in the northwest corner of the tow^n and the headwaters of Noroton River 7 square miles in the southwest corner. A north-south strip 1 to 1^ miles wide through A ^ ,JUppo..c^ River ^j^^.^f^ " ""-^TZ^V^"^ A SiLvermirbe Vertical scale twice the horizontal FiiiunK 14. — I'l-oflie ;u:j'oss New Canaan {A-A' on Pis. II and III), showing undulating plateau and the valleys cut below it. the middle of the town is tributary to Fivemile River, which rises within the town limits. A similar strip along the east boundary is drained by Silvermine River. Near the head of Fivemile River is the reservoir of the New Canaan AVater Co., and on Silvermine is the Grupe reservoir of the first taxing district of the city of Norwalk. The lowest points in New Canaan are those where Noroton and Fivemile rivers cross the boundary about 115 feet above sea level, in the southwest and southeast corners of the town. The highest point is near the middle of the north boundary and is 620 feet above sea level. There is thus a range of elevation of about 500 feet. WATER-BEARING FORMATIONS. ScMst and gnehs.—'Yh^ bedrocks which underlie New Canaan have been identified as belonging tb four formations.^ Underlying an area of 2 square miles in the northwest corner of the town is the Berkshire schist. It is a medium to dark gray well-banded schist, composed essentially of black mica and quartz with some garnet, feldspar, and other accessory minerals. The small mica scales have '^ Gregory, H. E., and Robinson, H. H., Preliminary geological map of Connecticut : eomaecticnt Geo!, and Nat. Hist. Survey Bull. 7, 1907. NEW C^ANAAN. 77 ill liirgi." part been seaiviiatcd and tiirnod parallel to one another, so tliat they form dark bands that allei-nate witli <]uartz bands and ii;ive the rock its fissile, schistose character. There are many thin veins ol' white and pink <>Tanitic material injected alonijj and across tlic chnivage planes. I'he bedrock of a circular area a mile in diameter in the north l)art of the borough and of an area half as laroe in the soutlieast corner of the town is the Danbnrv granodiorite gneiss. This gneiss is a moderately coarse igneous rock composed essentially of feldspar and quai-tz with black mica or hornblende or both. In this region there is a tendency for certain of the feldspar crystals to be larger than others and thus to give the rock a porphyritic character. Honi- blende is more abundant than elsewhere in the formation. Since its original consolidation from a state of igneous fusion, the rock has undergone metamorphism and has been changed to a gneiss. The gneissic texture is similar to the schistose texture of the Berkshire schist in character but is far less well developed. There is less mica, and the hornblende is less clea^able, so that tlie rock splits into thicker slabs and with more difficulty. An area of about a square mile in the southeast corner of the town is underlain by the Becket granite gneiss. According to Gregory,^ it Avas probably originally a