Chicopee in the 1940s

In 1935, Chicopee was a small city struggling to emerge from a crippling depression and economic collapse. In 1936, the Connecticut River flooded, turning Chicopee's Willimansett section into a giant lake, and on September 21, 1938, a storm roared up the Connecticut Valley with winds of over 100 miles per hour. Rain flooded the already devastated streets and wiped out the Chicopee Falls Bridge. Between these disasters, the U.S. Congress passed the Wilcox Act, and in 1939, Secretary of War H...