Marathon Pundit: (Photos) Algonquin Dam on the Fox River

A combination birthday party and going away send-off brought Little Marathon Pundit and I to Algonquin, Illinois, a far-northwestern Chicago suburb on the Fox River, on Sunday.

It's home to the Algonquin Dam which is appropriately a few feet downriver from Algonquin Road.

That's the reservoir created by the dam, which I photographed from the Algonquin Road bridge.

From the grounds of Port Edward Restaurant, Little Marathon Pundit took this picture.

In the background is the dam, a concrete low-head one. Before the bridge there are warnings that the dam is near. As I commented in earlier posts, low-head dams are commonly nicknamed "drowning machines." Seven years ago two kayers nearly drowned here. Downstream in Geneva, a kayaker drowned last month after being caught in the hydraulic boil of a similar dam.

According to an historic marker near where I took this photo, this dam is the third one built on the site. The firs was completed in 1850. It was a working dam and was used to mill flour. The second dam, which was built in 1888, was constructed with the goal of improving fishing. The last dam was built for recreational purposes--the reservoir made boating much easier.

As for low-head dams overall, there is a nationwide movement to remove as many of them as possible.

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