On the Massachusetts North Shore
In 1984, the Town of Ipswich laid a sewer along an old footpath beside the Ipswich River between The County St. and Green Street stone arch bridges. In 1998 the Mass. Highway Dept. completed construction of the Sidney Shurcliff Riverwalk, due in part to efforts by Sidney Shurcliff's sister Alice.
The Ipswich River Watershed Association and NOAA are organizing a drop-in event to be held at Town Hall for the public to come in and ask questions and have conversations with a series of experts who are familiar with different aspects of the Ipswich Mills Dam removal project.
At the Essex National Heritage Commission’s annual gathering, Executive Director Annie Harris surprised our own Wayne Castonguay by presenting him with the 2022 Pioneer in Partnership Award.
In partnership with the Parker River Clean Water Association, the Ipswich River Watershed Association produced a new video on the plight of the Egypt River. The video begins by asking Ipswich residents the question “Where is the Egypt River’?”
The American Elm tree at the corner of County and East Streets succumbed to Dutch Elm disease in 2012, but a polished cross section is on display at the Ipswich Town Hall.
Fourteen inches of rain fell between May 14 and May 16, 2006, creating the historic 2006 Mothers Day Flood. Water flow levels in the Ipswich River were 27% higher than recorded in previous epic floods.
The canal was completed in 1917 under a Massachusetts "Act to Provide an Additional Water Supply for the Cities of Salem and Beverly" and transports water from the Ipswich River to Wenham Lake.
Until the second half of the 19th Century, much of the area bounded by Central Street, Washington Street, Mineral Street and Market Street was a wetland with an open sewer known as Farley Brook running through it.
In1968, Mass DPW proposed an additional beltway around Boston that would have cut through the Ipswich River Sanctuary, Bradley Palmer State Park, Appleton Farms, the Pingree Reservation and Manchester-Essex Woods. Plans were eventually abandoned because of resistance from communities that would have been affected.
A heat wave during the summer of 1896 produced 1500 deaths from the Midwest to New England. Fifteen years later the record for heat-related fatalities was broken.
Concerns about the environmental toll that dams have on the Ipswich River date back to 1773.
Recipe For Disaster is a six minute video about the explosion of European Green Crabs in the Great Salt Marsh. The mission of GreenCrab.org is to develop markets and promote consumption of green crabs to mitigate their invasive impact.
The Town of Ipswich is an investor in Berkshire Wind, an array of wind turbines on Brodie Mountain in the Berkshires. Two turbines added this summer increased the generating capacity to 19.6 megawatts, enough for almost 9000 homes.
In 2010, the Ipswich Board of Selectmen voted to begin exploring removal of the Ipswich Mills Dam. The feasibility study was completed in March, 2019 and will set the stage for the Town's decision regarding the dam.
This short videotape about the Great Marsh promotes the value of this resource and places it in the context of the historical landscape,
Historic Ipswich 