Wacky and Wonderful Niagara Falls

Posted by Cathy Marie Buchanan, 4 years ago

Credit: Library of Congress, cph 3b15325

Take a look at a few of the many historical pics you'll find between the covers of my debut novel, The Day the Falls Stood Still.

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The Day the Falls Stood Still Covers

Posted by Cathy Marie Buchanan, 4 years ago

Take a look at these covers for my debut novel and vote.

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The Day the Falls Stood Still: Pondering the Title

Posted by Cathy Marie Buchanan, 4 years ago

I’m guessing that at least some readers looking at the cover of The Day the Falls Stood Still would assume the title is a metaphor for the cataclysmic power of young love. We all know the language -- heart-stopping, earth-shattering, dizzying. “Falls-stilling” just might pop into reader’s minds as they think back to their own first thrilling kiss. The assumption would be right; there is in fact a love story between the covers of the book.

But the significance of the title runs deeper than a metaphor. The term “the day the falls stood still” was coined back in 1848 to describe the very real day the locals of Niagara Falls woke to quiet rather than to the thunder of the river plummeting from the brink of Niagara Falls. With the cliff face of their falls and the riverbed bone dry, some citizens ducked into churches, praying for their salvation, feeling Armageddon so close at hand. Others headed out onto the riverbed, salvaging lost timbers, collecting relics from the War of 1812.

In The Day the Falls Stood Still the event marks the arrival of Fergus Cole in Niagara Falls. After years of experiencing Cole’s accurate predictions -- the first being that the river was only dammed up with ice and would, any moment, come hurtling down the channel -- and witnessing his heroic river rescues, folks start saying “the day the falls stood still” was the river’s way of paying homage to Fergus Cole.

The title works on another level, too. Fergus passes on his reverence for the Niagara River and his uncanny ability to predict its every whim to his grandson, Tom Cole. But by the early 1900s, when Tom takes over as Niagara’s riverman, true to history, the power companies, including Sir Adam Beck’s Hydro Electric Power Commission, have set their sights on the falls. By taking water from the upper river, diverting it around the falls using tunnels and a canal, and creating their own waterfalls hidden inside penstocks miles downstream, the power companies manage to make hydroelectricity. And there are plenty of men who would like nothing better than to harness every bit of the power still running to waste over the falls.

With ever more water being diverted, Tom Cole sees his river as diminished and he despairs at the possibility that his beloved falls may one day truly stand still. The Day the Falls Stood Still chronicles the early days of massive hydroelectric development on the Niagara River. Today, more often than not, those standing at the brink of Niagara Falls are only seeing a quarter of the river’s natural flow cascading over the edge.

A fitting title, I think

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The Truth About The Day the Falls Stood Still

Posted by Cathy Marie Buchanan, 4 years ago

Before putting pen to paper, I researched the history of Niagara Falls for four months, and throughout the writing, I was constantly turning back to the history books. With Niagara Falls’s storied past, I found plenty of fodder. The difficulty lay in figuring out what to use. The river stunts (Captain Matthew Webb’s fateful swim, Maud Willard’s suffocation, Walter Campbell’s gondolier-like navigation of the rapids, Charles Stephens’s daring plunge with an anvil tied to his feet) are based on actual events. The accidents (the careening trolley car at Queenston, the collapse of Table Rock) are as well, along with the Ellet’s bridge, ice bridge, and scow rescues. Loretto Academy, Glenview, the Windsor Hotel, and the power companies are described as they were during the time frame of the book. The story details surrounding the development of hydroelectricity at Niagara Falls are factual. The term “the day the falls stood still” was coined back in 1848 to describe the very real day the river became jammed up with ice and ceased to flow. And one last bit of lore, which it would be remiss not to mention here: Archbishop Lynch did in fact see a picture of the falls as a boy and conjure up prayers floating heavenward with the mist, a notion that would, years later, lead to the tradition of perpetual adoration at Loretto Academy.

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