More background on Westfield Reservoir aka Montgomery Reservoir:
This reservoir along with the further south Tekoa Reservoir were both built in 1874. Chauncey D. Allen was in charge of the massive project which carried a price tag of a quarter of a million dollars. In 1874 that wasn't exactly pocket change!
Montgomery Reservoir was built to hold a capacity of 125 million gallons, though according to the Westfield Water Dept.'s website, it has a modern-day capacity of 184 million gallons.
The reservoir was taken off-line in 1974 because of water purity issues. A step Chauncey failed to take when he built the Montgomery Reservoir was to scoop away the earth to the bedrock below the area to be flooded, an oversight which later came back to haunt the city with tap water that was unpleasant to the senses of taste, smell and sight.
