Housatonic River. The Housatonic River is a river, approximately 149 miles long, in western Massachusetts and western Connecticut in the United States.
It flows south to southeast, and drains about 1,950 square miles of southwestern Connecticut into Long Island Sound. Its watershed is just to the west of the watershed of the lower Connecticut River.
Birds and fish who live in and around the river contain significant levels of PCBs and present health risks. Indigenous people began using the river area for fishing and hunting at least 6,000 years ago.
By 1600, the inhabitants were mostly Mohicans and may have numbered 30,000. The river's name is derived from the Mohican phrase usi-a-di-en-uk, translated as beyond the mountain place or river of the mountain place.
It is referred to in the deed by which a group of twelve colonists called The Proprietors captured the land now called Sherman and New Fairfield as Ousetonack. Samuel Orcutt, a 19th-century historian, explained the term's pronunciation as more properly.Howsatunnuck and also noted an early spelling in the form of Oweantinock. Prior to the 18th century, the river was alternatively known as the Pootatuck River. Accounts differ on the origin of this name, with some claiming that Pootatuck is an Algonquian term translating to river of the falls while others relate the term was eponymous, reflecting the name of the tribe that had their principa
It flows south to southeast, and drains about 1,950 square miles of southwestern Connecticut into Long Island Sound. Its watershed is just to the west of the watershed of the lower Connecticut River.
Birds and fish who live in and around the river contain significant levels of PCBs and present health risks. Indigenous people began using the river area for fishing and hunting at least 6,000 years ago.
By 1600, the inhabitants were mostly Mohicans and may have numbered 30,000. The river's name is derived from the Mohican phrase usi-a-di-en-uk, translated as beyond the mountain place or river of the mountain place.
It is referred to in the deed by which a group of twelve colonists called The Proprietors captured the land now called Sherman and New Fairfield as Ousetonack. Samuel Orcutt, a 19th-century historian, explained the term's pronunciation as more properly.Howsatunnuck and also noted an early spelling in the form of Oweantinock. Prior to the 18th century, the river was alternatively known as the Pootatuck River. Accounts differ on the origin of this name, with some claiming that Pootatuck is an Algonquian term translating to river of the falls while others relate the term was eponymous, reflecting the name of the tribe that had their principa
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