The Housatonic River

The river you cross in the center of town is the Housatonic, and its name comes from a Mahican phrase meaning beyond the mountain place, or the river of the mountain place. For thousands of years it was the lifeline of the Mahican people, who fished its waters and farmed its floodplain long before English settlers arrived. In the industrial age the river turned mill wheels and powered paper and textile works up and down the valley.

But that same industry left a lasting wound. From the early nineteen thirties into the late nineteen seventies, a General Electric plant upstream in Pittsfield released large quantities of toxic industrial chemicals known as polychlorinated biphenyls into the water. These pollutants settled into the sediment and floodplain, drifting downstream through Great Barrington and beyond, and they persist in fish and soil to this day.

One of the longest running environmental cleanups in the country is still working to remove them. For all that, the Housatonic remains beautiful, a green corridor for herons, paddlers, and anglers, and the town has slowly turned back toward its river, adding walkways and gardens along its banks.