Six Mile Creek (Ithaca)
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Six Mile Creek is a creek in
Tompkins County, New York Tompkins County is a County (United States), county located in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. As of the United States Census 2020, 2020 census, the population was 105,740. The county seat is Ithaca, New York, Ithaca. The name is ...
. It originates in the Town of Dryden near the intersection of Irish Settlement Road (Tompkins County Highway 162A) and Card Road and drains into
Cayuga Inlet Cayuga Inlet is a river located in Tompkins County, New York. It flows into the south end of Cayuga Lake by Ithaca, New York. Development Cayuga Inlet is a popular and well-connected location for boating. Boaters are able to travel from Cayu ...
, which flows into
Cayuga Lake Cayuga Lake (, or ) is the longest of central New York's glacial Finger Lakes, and is the second largest in surface area (marginally smaller than Seneca Lake) and second largest in volume. It is just under long. Its average width is , and i ...
. Its watershed is the principal source of drinking water for the City of
Ithaca Ithaca most commonly refers to: *Homer's Ithaca, an island featured in Homer's ''Odyssey'' *Ithaca (island), an island in Greece, possibly Homer's Ithaca *Ithaca, New York, a city, and home of Cornell University and Ithaca College Ithaca, Ithaka ...
,
New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...
, and the surrounding communities. The headwaters lie on private land between Yellow Barn State Forest to the northwest and Hammond Hill State Forest to the southeast. It then flows south into the Town of Caroline, flowing parallel to Six Hundred Road and then crossing beneath
New York State Route 79 New York State Route 79 (NY 79) is a east–west state highway in the Southern Tier of New York, in the United States. The western terminus of the route is at the intersection with NY 414 near the southern end of Seneca Lake ...
in Slaterville Springs, after which it turns west until Brooktondale. There it turns northwest entering the
Town of Ithaca The Town of Ithaca is a former local government areas of Queensland, local government area of Queensland, Australia, located in inner western Brisbane. History The Ithaca Division was first proclaimed in 1879, and originally covered an area t ...
. From there, the flow is interrupted by a series of dams and then has its outlet at the Cayuga Inlet below the southern end of Cayuga Lake in the City of Ithaca.


History

Glaciation advanced and retreated along the creek valley in the late
Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( ; referred to colloquially as the ''ice age, Ice Age'') is the geological epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fin ...
Epoch until about 17,500 years ago. However, the exact details are debated. The main ice tongues split near modern-day Brooktondale, resulting in different hydrogeology between the upper valley, from the headwaters to Brooktondale, and the lower valley between Brooktondale and the outlet. Much of the upper valley is characterized by steep gorge walls. Because the lower valley was filled with sediments as the glaciers retreated, the new channel initially flowed without regard to its pre-glacial location. Over time, it washed away sediment filling pre-glacial gorges in some places, whereas in other reaches, it cut into the bedrock to create new post-glacial gorges. As the post-glacial gorges are narrower than the re-excavated pre-glacial gorges, the lower valley takes on the appearance of beads on a string. The lower creek valley was a transportation route into Ithaca. The
Cayuga people The Cayuga ( Cayuga: Gayogo̱hó꞉nǫʼ, "People of the Great Swamp") are one of the five original constituents of the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois), a confederacy of Native Americans in New York. The Cayuga homeland lies in the Finger Lakes re ...
named the creek Teegastoweas. It was given its current name by English settlers, marking the distance from the crossing near Brooktondale to the trail junction at the Cascadilla crossing in Ithaca. Water flowing down the steep valley powered numerous sawmills in the area, and at least one grist mill, the Van Natta Mill in Ithaca. Several dams were raised on the lower creek in the late 19th and early 20th centuries at each “bead” on the gorge. The mill dam above the Van Natta
gristmill A gristmill (also: grist mill, corn mill, flour mill, feed mill or feedmill) grinds cereal grain into flour and Wheat middlings, middlings. The term can refer to either the grinding mechanism or the building that holds it. Grist is grain that h ...
, known as First Dam or Van Natta's Dam, was purchased by the Ithaca Water and Light Company in 1892 to provide a drinking water supply for the city; the abandoned mill is still a prominent landmark. In 1902, the structure known as Second Dam or the 30-foot Dam was constructed upstream. A third dam, known as the 60-foot Dam, Third Dam, or Potters Fall Dam, was built in 1911. Finally, in 1925, a siltation trap, known as the Silt Dam, was built above the 60-foot Dam. The reservoir behind the 60-foot Dam, sometimes called Ithaca Reservoir, is a major water supply reservoir for the City of Ithaca. In 2010, the city approved a plan to refurbish the water treatment plant rather than join the Southern Cayuga Lake Inter-municipal Water Supply Commission, Bolton Point Water System. The reservoir above Second Dam has become a popular swimming area, although technically illegal, raising concerns about noise, crime, littering, and safety. Although volunteer rangers patrol the area, they do not have the power to write tickets or make arrests and must contact the Tompkins County Sheriff for enforcement actions. In 2015, a man drowned in the reservoir behind Second Dam, prompting discussion about increasing targeted enforcement.


References

{{authority control Ithaca, New York Rivers of New York (state) Rivers of Tompkins County, New York