Floods on the Susquehanna

Floods have long shaped life along the West Branch of the Susquehanna River, where thousands of years of periodic flooding created a fertile valley once dominated by massive white pines. Settlers later cut these pines, farmed the rich soil, and built towns along the river for transportation and water-powered industry, inevitably confronting repeated floods. Because the West Branch drains nearly 7,000 square miles, widespread rainstorms and spring runoff send immense water loads downstream, and in the late 1800s logging across the Susquehanna watershed worsened flooding by speeding runoff and washing soil into the river. Williamsport has been periodically inundated since its founding in 1795; in the Great Flood of 1889, six feet of water submerged downtown, raging waters breached the Susquehanna Boom and sent 200 million board feet of logs downstream, and the floodwaters destroyed the West Branch Canal after 60 years of reliable river transport. In 1936 the city suffered its worst flood, with waters rising to High Street. After losing two aunts and seven cousins in the 1889 flood, District Attorney John Youngman, Sr. led the effort after 1936 to build dikes to protect the city. Although construction began in the early 1940s, two more floods struck before the Army Corps of Engineers completed the flood protection system in 1955. The dike system then withstood major tests in 1972, when Hurricane Agnes brought the West Branch to within a foot of the levee's top, and again in 1996, when it kept floodwaters out of the city though much of the surrounding countryside was inundated.

South Williamsport, Pennsylvania · United States