Well I'll Be Dam'd: Pump Up The Volume Traditional Cache
karaoke_diva: unable to maintain
Well I'll Be Dam'd: Pump Up The Volume
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
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Related Web Page
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The circular walk around the Dam is approximately 3 miles (4.5km) and some of the paths may be muddy.
Gartmorn Dam is a 370 acre park which is a haven for wildlife and a place of peaceful recreation for many people.
Open daily from around 9am to dusk - toilets, displays, information, refreshments and permit sales at the visitor centre. Picnic and barbecue areas for public use throughout park. Wheelchair access on some routes. Free parking
HISTORY
When Sir John Erskine, the sixth Earl of Mar, inherited the Alloa Estate in 1689, many debts came with it. Sir John, an important statesman of the time, rose to meet the challenge.
In 1710 he secured a customs house for the port of Alloa and in doing so, began the boom in local industry. The demand for coal was fast increasing and Lord Mar took advantage of this by improving his mines in Sauchie.
As surface coal ran out and mines grew deeper, flooding became a problem. The famous Welsh engineer, George Sorocauld was brought in for advice and water pumps were built at the ‘Holtone’ pit in Sauchie. These pumps were driven by a huge water wheel which needed more water than could be found in the Sauchie or Brothie burns.
A weir was built on the river Black Devon at Forestmill and a lade dug out two miles to the marshy hollow that was then Gartmorn. An earthen dam held back the water, provided a constant supply for the Sauchie pumps and creating the largest artificial body of water in Scotland at that time.
The Erskine family carried on improvements throughout Alloa during the 18th century. The sixth Earl developed his estate into one of the finest in Scotland but was unable to enjoy it fully as he was exiled to France after the Jacobite rebellion of 1715. In 1750 Lady Frances Erskine began Alloa Glassworks and later, her son John Frances created cast iron railed waggonways from the pits to the harbour.
The tailrace from the water wheel, together with the flow from the local burns, provided a source of power that made the Brothie burn valley the industrial centre of Alloa. Industries such as tobacco, snuff and corn grinding were later replaced by distilling, brewing and spinning. Before steam power took over in the 1860s, the tailrace powered up to three colliery engines and nine mills.
In the early 19th century, the wells throughout Alloa could not supply enough water for the growing needs of an industrial town. The Earl of Mar first granted the Burgh the right to extract water from the tailrace in 1820 but by 1869 more water had to be taken directly from the reservoir. The Alloa Water Act was passed in 1891, the reservoir enlarged and a filter station built. The Dam could then supply water to the growing number of homes and businesses and continued to do so (with the later addition of a modern filter station at Jellyholme) for over 100 years.
This booklet is also available from the Visitors' Centre:
(visit link)
PUMP HOUSE
From 1891 the pump house the engines which pumped water to the filterbeds.
WHEELCHAIR USERS:
Read Spoiler at start of Cache Logs (encrypted)
Container with log book and pencil.
Pump Up The Volume (visit link)
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
iragf