Mother Brook (Dedham, Massachusetts)

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Mother Brook is the OLDEST "man-made" canal in the United States. It was built in 1639 to divert water from the Charles River to power mills on what was then called the East Brook (which in turn fed into the Neponset). The mills are mostly gone (and the ones that remain are now apartments), but the brook is still there, diverting up to 25% of the Charles' water to the Neponset (although now to help control flooding in the Charles River Basin).

For much of its course, the Mother Brook is a quiet, forgotten backwater (in some cases, even hidden - it runs in a culvert under the parking lot for the Pizzeria Uno in Dedham) that runs through Dedham and Readville before entering the Neponset in Hyde Park.

Echoes of the mills remain (Saw Mill Lane and Stone Mill Drive, which cross the brook). Centennial Dam now sits beside an apartment complex built out of a former mill on Stone Mill Drive. Because it connects the Charles with the Neponset, one could say that, technically, it makes the city of Boston an island!