Trails and Treasures

About 75 years before the Army started to build a new training camp near West Point, Kentucky that would be named in honor of Henry Knox, the Army began building a massive fortification on the Penobscot River in Maine that bore the name Fort Knox.  Knox was the Continental Army’s chief of artillery during the Revolutionary War whose retirement home Montpelier in Thomaston, Maine I described in an earlier post. 

Fort Knox on the Penobscot River across from Bucksport

Control of the Penobscot River, almost directly west of the southern tip of Nova Scotia, made it important to both the British and the Americans.  It was the scene for the fledgling break-away colonies first major naval defeat in 1779, and the British regained control during the War of 1812.  Thus, it was a logical location to place one of about 40 forts started as part of the Third System of defense in 1844.  Construction on Fort Knox continued for almost 25 years, but as the Civil War drew to a close, concerns about a sea-born invasion waned and the fort’s barracks were never completed.

Interior of Fort Knox from the rooftop battery

Doorways connect the unfinished enlisted men's quarters

Fort Knox is a massive granite-walled fortification with mounts for 135 cannon, some in batteries and some in casemates.  A diagram showing the layout of the fort can be found here.

The exterior granite walls are indicative of the fine quality of workmanship

The largest number of troops ever stationed at the fort was 575 when a Connecticut regiment lived outside the walls in tents for a month during the Spanish-American War.  During the Civil War 20 to 54 troops were garrisoned at the fort.  For the best part of fifty years, after construction stopped in 1869, a non-commissioned officer served as the sole guardian of the fort.

Battery B

Series of vaulted-ceiling casemates

Only 74 cannon were ever placed on the 135 mounts

This will probably be my last post about my trip to Maine, so let me close with one of those quintessential Maine seaport views.  This one was taken from the roof of the fort’s casemates.

Bucksport and the Penobscot River

Waldo-Hancock Bridge over the Penobscot River

In 1931 the Waldo-Hancock Suspension Bridge began carrying Route 1 traffic over the Penobscot River.

Waldo-Hancock Bridge

Now on the list of National Historic Civil Engineering Landmarks, this bridge was one of two concurrent bridge projects to first use prestressed wire rope strand cables.  It was also the first suspension bridge built with the Vierendeel truss.

In 2006 a new bridge was completed.

Old and new bridges over the Penobscot

The new Penobscot Narrows Bridge is the only observatory bridge in the Western Hemisphere and the tallest in the world at 420 feet.

The observatory is at 420'

The obelisk towers may remind you of the Washington Monument.  That’s because they were designed to pay homage to the local granite industry which harvested granite from nearby Mount Waldo for the construction of the monument.

Penobscot Narrows Bridge

From the observatory one gets a bird’s eye view of nearby Fort Knox, which I’ll discuss in my next post.

Fort Knox from the observatory

Doesn't it remind you of the Washington Monument?

The old and the new from the tower

The new bridge does have its problems though.  One day I saw an article in the Bangor Daily News about how the elevator tends to stop working–especially in high winds, and each 911 call costs the local community $1,000.  On October 10th, the elevator got stuck twice–once in the morning and once in the afternoon.

Bridges over the Penobscot