City of Bath

City of Bath. If there hadn't been a Kennebec River, there wouldn't be a City of Bath.. Vertical rock layers of varying hardness formed both the valley now drowned by the river and the banks that step gradually higher from the water. Bath's topography today runs generally north and south because tectonic plate collisions in the far distant past gave rock layers that orientation. In the last 200 million years, erosion by rivers and, more recently, by glacial ice sheets left ridges of granite bedrock, and valleys where the rock layers were more easily worn down., These geologic processes left a long, deep, straight stretch of river with a sandy bottom and gentle slopes at the river's edge, perfect for launching a small brig, a large 6-masted schooner, or a huge destroyer. This north-south stretch was part of a larger watery road, the Kennebec River, which connected the ocean with inland Maine., Caption of the top photo on the marker reads: , Cyrus King (1816-1881), the only son of Governor William King, drew the busy Kennebec River and Bath about 1844. His detailed work was translated to this lithograph, a rare image of Bath as the community began a transformative period of expansion. Courtesy of Patten Free Library., Caption of the right photo on the marker reads: , Detail of the Bedrock Geology of the Bath Quadrangle, Maine. Arthur M. Hussey II and Robert G. Marvinney (2002)., Caption of the bottom photo on the marker reads: , Vertical layers of bedrock, running north and south, control the local topography, or character of the natural landscape. The Kennebec River Valley and the low area at Water Street are supported by mica-rich bedrock that erodes easily. The higher portions, such as downtown Bath at Front and Centre Streets and the ridge where High Street runs, rest on a foundation of quartz and feldspar-rich bedrock that resists erosion.