Burr Pond State Park

Burr Pond State Park in Torrington, Connecticut, combines modern recreation with the remains of an earlier industrial site. The eighty-five-acre man-made pond was created in 1851 when Milo Burr dammed local streams to power a tannery and three sawmills. From 1857 to 1861, one of those buildings housed Gail Borden’s first commercially successful condensed milk factory, and its stone foundations still survive. Formerly part of Paugnut State Forest, the land became a state park in 1949. Today the four-hundred-thirty-eight-acre park offers swimming, boating, fishing, picnic areas, and trails around a pond known for its inlets, islands, rocky shoreline, and steep underwater drop-offs.

Torrington, Connecticut · United States