Mount Tom, , is a steep, rugged

traprock mountain Traprock or trap rock may refer to: * Trap rock, form of igneous rock exhibiting polygonal vertical fractures * Traprock Important Bird Area, Queensland, Australia * Trap Rock River, Michigan, USA * Walter E. Traprock, pseudonym of American archi ...

peak on the west bank of the Connecticut River 4.5 miles (7 km) northwest of downtown

Holyoke Holyoke is a city in Hampden County, Massachusetts, United States, that lies between the western bank of the Connecticut River and the Mount Tom Range. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 38,238. Located north of Springfield ...

Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett language, Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut assachusett writing systems, məhswatʃəwiːsət'' English: , ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is the most populous U.S. state, state in the New England ...

. The mountain is the southernmost and highest peak of the

Mount Tom Range The Mount Tom Range is a traprock mountain range located in the Connecticut River Valley of Massachusetts. It is part of the Metacomet Ridge that extends from Long Island Sound near New Haven, Connecticut, north through the Connecticut River Valle ...

and the highest traprock peak of the long

Metacomet Ridge The Metacomet Ridge, Metacomet Ridge Mountains, or Metacomet Range of southern New England is a narrow and steep fault-block mountain ridge known for its extensive cliff faces, scenic vistas, microclimate ecosystems, and rare or endangered plants. ...

. A popular outdoor recreation resource, the mountain is known for its continuous line of cliffs and talus slopes visible from the south and west, its dramatic rise over the surrounding Connecticut River Valley, and its rare plant communities and

microclimate A microclimate (or micro-climate) is a local set of atmospheric conditions that differ from those in the surrounding areas, often with a slight difference but sometimes with a substantial one. The term may refer to areas as small as a few squ ...

ecosystems.''The Metacomet-Monadnock Trail Guide''. 9th Edition. The Appalachian Mountain Club. Amherst, Massachusetts, 1999.Farnsworth, Elizabeth J.
Metacomet-Mattabesett Trail Natural Resource Assessment.
" 2004. PDF wefile cited November 1, 2007. Located in Easthampton and Holyoke, Mount Tom is traversed by the

Metacomet-Monadnock Trail The Metacomet-Monadnock Trail (M&M Trail) is a hiking trail that traverses the Metacomet Ridge of the Pioneer Valley region of Massachusetts and the central uplands of Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire. Although less than from Boston and ...

and is the transmitter location for three Springfield–Holyoke television stations:

WGBY WGBY-TV (channel 57) is a PBS member television station in Springfield, Massachusetts, United States. Owned by the Boston-based WGBH Educational Foundation, it is a sister station to that organization's flagship and namesake, WGBH-TV (channe ...

WGGB WGGB-TV (channel 40) is a television station in Springfield, Massachusetts, United States, affiliated with ABC, Fox, and MyNetworkTV. It is owned by Gray Television alongside low-power CBS affiliate WSHM-LD (channel 3.7). Both stations shar ...

, and

WSHM-LD WSHM-LD (channel 3.7) is a low-power television station in Springfield, Massachusetts, United States, affiliated with CBS. It is owned by Gray Television alongside ABC/ Fox/MyNetworkTV affiliate WGGB-TV (channel 40). Both stations share stu ...

, and for radio stations WHYN-FM and

WWEI WWEI (105.5 FM; "SportsRadio 105.5") is a radio station in Easthampton, Massachusetts, serving Springfield with a sports radio format. The station is owned by Audacy, Inc. Most programming is provided by Boston sister station WEEI-FM. History ...

. The name "Mount Tom" is sometimes used to describe the entire Mount Tom Range.

History

According to popular folklore, Mount Tom takes its name from

Rowland Thomas Rowland Thomas (–1698) of Springfield, Massachusetts was an English colonist, selectman, stonemason, surveyor, and proprietor, and the namesake of Mount Tom, originally known as Mount Thomas, which he was said to have surveyed in tandem wi ...

, a surveyor who worked for the settlement of

Springfield, Massachusetts Springfield is a city in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, United States, and the seat of Hampden County. Springfield sits on the eastern bank of the Connecticut River near its confluence with three rivers: the western Westfield River, the ...

in the 1660s. Thomas supposedly named Mount Tom after himself while his fellow surveyor working on the opposite side of the Connecticut River,

Elizur Holyoke Elizur Holyoke (1618 1676) of Springfield, Massachusetts was an English colonist, surveyor, scribe, soldier, the namesake of the mountain, Mount Holyoke, and indirectly, of the city of Holyoke, Massachusetts. Background Elizur Holyoke arriv ...

, gave his name to

Mount Holyoke Mount Holyoke, a traprock mountain, elevation , is the westernmost peak of the Holyoke Range and part of the 100-mile (160 km) Metacomet Ridge. The mountain is located in the Connecticut River Valley of western Massachusetts, and is the ...

. In 1897 the Holyoke Street Railway Company began constructing the Mount Tom Railroad, as well as what would become known as " Mountain Park", a

trolley park Trolley may refer to: Vehicles and components * Tram, or trolley or streetcar, a rail vehicle that runs on tramway tracks * Trolleybus, or trolley, an electric bus drawing power from overhead wires using trolley poles ** Trolleytruck, a trolleyb ...

and later an

amusement park An amusement park is a park that features various attractions, such as rides and games, as well as other events for entertainment purposes. A theme park is a type of amusement park that bases its structures and attractions around a central ...

on the east side of the mountain. The project changed hands several times until its closure in 1988 when competition from larger amusement parks gradually sapped business away from what had become affectionately known by local residents as "The Queen of the Mountain".''Mt. Holyoke Range Historical Timeline''
Website cited November 12, 2007. The Mount Tom Summit House was also constructed on the cliffs of Mount Tom in 1897, but it burned three years later. Subsequently rebuilt, the second house also burned in 1929, in part due to a series of failures in its water systems. The original foundation was not used again, however days later it was decided a much cheaper and smaller sheet metal structure would be built adjacent to it, housing a restaurant and souvenir stand. Because of its construction and lack of grandeur however, it remained unpopular, with one local patron, Katherine Root, remarking "the wind sounded like thunder when it roared through the building and it rattled constantly"; it was ultimately dismantled a year after the railroad, in 1939. The ruins of the old summit house foundations remain prominent structures, visible on the mountainside today. In 1933 the

Civilian Conservation Corps The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was a voluntary government work relief program that ran from 1933 to 1942 in the United States for unemployed, unmarried men ages 18–25 and eventually expanded to ages 17–28. The CCC was a major part of ...

assisted with the construction of reservation structures and park roads; their work also remains visible today. During the heyday of northern New England's logging and river drives during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the spring freshet, augmented by impoundments called drive-dams or squirt-dams on far-flung upper tributaries, carried logs rolled into rivers and lakes far down the Connecticut River to mills at falls where the river was pinched by bedrock at Mount Tom. For many logging company workers, the specialists called river-hogs, the end of the drive at Mount Tom spelled the end of their employment until they joined crews going into the woods the next fall. On July 9, 1946, a US Army Air Force

B-17G Flying Fortress The Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress is a four-engined heavy bomber developed in the 1930s for the United States Army Air Corps (USAAC). Relatively fast and high-flying for a bomber of its era, the B-17 was used primarily in the European Theater ...

, in use as a military transport, hit the northern flank of the mountain. All 25 on board died instantly in a large fireball. Some of the men were Public Health employees of the US military who had worked in Europe in World War II. Sixteen were U.S. Coast Guardsmen returning from duty in Greenland. Tiny pieces of the plane are still on the mountainside, and the site is accessible on a road built over the former funicular railway to access antennae at the summit. A memorial site, dedicated 6 July 1996, is at the location and is lit at all times.

Geology and ecology

Mount Tom, like much of the Metacomet Ridge, is composed of

basalt Basalt (; ) is an aphanite, aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the planetary surface, surface of a terrestrial ...

, also called traprock, a

volcanic A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most often found where tectonic plates a ...

rock. The mountain formed near the end of the

Triassic Period The Triassic ( ) is a geologic period and system which spans 50.6 million years from the end of the Permian Period 251.902 million years ago ( Mya), to the beginning of the Jurassic Period 201.36 Mya. The Triassic is the first and shortest period ...

with the

rifting In geology, a rift is a linear zone where the lithosphere is being pulled apart and is an example of extensional tectonics. Typical rift features are a central linear downfaulted depression, called a graben, or more commonly a half-graben ...

apart of the

North America North America is a continent in the Northern Hemisphere and almost entirely within the Western Hemisphere. It is bordered to the north by the Arctic Ocean, to the east by the Atlantic Ocean, to the southeast by South America and the Car ...

n continent from

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

and

Eurasia Eurasia (, ) is the largest continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. Primarily in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres, it spans from the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula in the west to the Japanese archipelago a ...

Lava Lava is molten or partially molten rock (magma) that has been expelled from the interior of a terrestrial planet (such as Earth) or a moon onto its surface. Lava may be erupted at a volcano or through a fracture in the crust, on land or un ...

welled up from the rift and solidified into sheets of strata hundreds of feet thick. Subsequent

faulting In geology, a fault is a planar fracture or discontinuity in a volume of rock across which there has been significant displacement as a result of rock-mass movements. Large faults within Earth's crust result from the action of plate tectonic ...

and

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from ...

activity tilted the strata, creating the dramatic cliffs and ridges of Mount Tom. Hot, dry upper slopes, cool, moist ravines, and mineral-rich ledges of basalt talus produce a combination of

ecosystems on the mountain that support plant and animal species uncommon in greater Massachusetts. (See

for more information on the geology and ecosystem of Mount Nonotuck.)

Recreation

Mount Tom is a popular outdoor recreation resource; the summit is crossed by the

as well as a network of shorter

hiking Hiking is a long, vigorous walk, usually on trails or footpaths in the countryside. Walking for pleasure developed in Europe during the eighteenth century.AMATO, JOSEPH A. "Mind over Foot: Romantic Walking and Rambling." In ''On Foot: A Histor ...

trails and a park road that passes beneath the western cliff face. The road is used for

bicycling Cycling, also, when on a two-wheeled bicycle, called bicycling or biking, is the use of cycles for transport, recreation, exercise or sport. People engaged in cycling are referred to as "cyclists", "bicyclists", or "bikers". Apart from two ...

, running, and

mountain biking Mountain biking is a sport of riding bicycles off-road, often over rough terrain, usually using specially designed mountain bikes. Mountain bikes share similarities with other bikes but incorporate features designed to enhance durability and pe ...

, and in the winter,

cross country skiing Cross-country skiing is a form of skiing where skiers rely on their own locomotion to move across snow-covered terrain, rather than using ski lifts or other forms of assistance. Cross-country skiing is widely practiced as a sport and recreatio ...

and

ski touring Ski touring is skiing in the backcountry on unmarked or unpatrolled areas. Touring is typically done off-piste and outside of ski resorts, and may extend over a period of more than one day. It is similar to backcountry skiing but excludes the ...

Geocaching Geocaching is an outdoor recreational activity, in which participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or mobile device and other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers, called "geocaches" or "caches", at specific l ...

is popular. The mountain is also well known as a place to watch seasonal

raptor Raptor or RAPTOR may refer to: Animals The word "raptor" refers to several groups of bird-like dinosaurs which primarily capture and subdue/kill prey with their talons. * Raptor (bird) or bird of prey, a bird that primarily hunts and feeds on ...

migrations; an observation tower on nearby Goat Peak is maintained for that purpose. Mount Tom is registered in

Amateur Radio Amateur radio, also known as ham radio, is the use of the radio frequency spectrum for purposes of non-commercial exchange of messages, wireless experimentation, self-training, private recreation, radiosport, contesting, and emergency communic ...

as SOTA W1/MB-006.

Conservation

Most of Mount Tom has been conserved as part of Massachusetts' Mount Tom State Reservation, conservation easement, or watershed protection land. The mountain was also once home to the

Mount Tom Ski Area Mount Tom Ski Area was a ski resort in Holyoke, Massachusetts, in the Mount Tom Range The Mount Tom Range is a traprock mountain range located in the Connecticut River Valley of Massachusetts. It is part of the Metacomet Ridge that extends fr ...

that operated from 1962 to 1998; although the ski area is closed, the slopes are still used for

backcountry skiing Backcountry skiing ( US), also called off-piste (Europe), alpine touring, or out-of-area, is skiing in the backcountry on unmarked or unpatrolled areas either inside or outside a ski resort's boundaries. This contrasts with alpine skiing, which i ...

, and the defunct ski area has been conserved by the concerted efforts of several non-profit organizations and the

Commonwealth of Massachusetts Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...

. These groups do not plan on re-opening the ski area.The Trustees of the Reservation.
Cited Dec. 21, 2007.

Cultural references

* Mount Tom is mentioned by the eponymous protagonist in

Henry James Henry James ( – ) was an American-British author. He is regarded as a key transitional figure between literary realism and literary modernism, and is considered by many to be among the greatest novelists in the English language. He was the ...

's 1875 novel ''

Roderick Hudson ''Roderick Hudson'' is a novel by Henry James. Originally published between January and December 1875 as a serial in '' The Atlantic Monthly'', it is a bildungsroman that traces the development of the title character, a sculptor. Plot summary Ro ...

'', chapter IX. * Mount Tom may have been

Dr. Seuss Theodor Seuss Geisel (;"Seuss"
'' Thomas Charles Farrer completed a painting of Mount Tom. Farrer alludes to the end of the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...

by including a man in

Union Army During the American Civil War, the Union Army, also known as the Federal Army and the Northern Army, referring to the United States Army, was the land force that fought to preserve the Union (American Civil War), Union of the collective U.S. st ...

attire.

References

External links

Metacomet-Monadnock Trail

Mount Tom State Reservation map

The Trustees of Reservations

Appalachian Mountain Club

Massachusetts Department of Conservation and Recreation

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tom, Mount Geography of Holyoke, Massachusetts Mountains of Massachusetts Massachusetts natural resources Mount Tom Range Mountains of Hampden County, Massachusetts Civilian Conservation Corps in Massachusetts Tourist attractions in Hampden County, Massachusetts Volcanism of Massachusetts Triassic volcanism