Case Mountain

Case Mountain
Frozen waterfalls under the Case Pond Bridge in Manchester, Connecticut.
Location	Manchester and Glastonbury, CT
Nearest city	Hartford, Connecticut
Area	640 acres (2.6 km2) within town of Manchester
Governing body	Town of Manchester

Located in the southeastern section of Manchester, Connecticut, the Case Mountain Recreational Area encompasses 640 acres (2.6 km²) of combined open space and watershed land stretching from the Glastonbury border north to Case Pond. Some trails lead south across the Glastonbury border to a larger area of land owned by the Town of Manchester to maintain the Buckingham Reservoir and provide drinking water to Manchester. The land around the reservoir is open to recreation. While there is a hill named Case Mountain in this area, locals refer to this entire trail system and forest in Manchester and Glastonbury simply as “Case Mountain.”

The Case family were prominent industrialists in Manchester where they operated a paper mill and water bottling facility. In 1861 Alfred Wells Case and his twin brother Albert Willard Case opened the Case Brothers Inc. paper mill in Highland Park where they produced washed cotton supplied to the Union Army during the Civil War. At the end of the war, the Case brothers began a specialized papermaking operation and soon became a leader in the manufacturing of pressboard, a strong paper product used as album board, shoe board, and binder board. They were true Connecticut Yankees that ran an efficient, innovative, highly skilled operation, and the company continued to flourish as the New England paper industry reached its peak. In 1878 the company won first prize for its pressed paper at the International Paris Exposition, competing with many European paper manufacturers, and achieved further success at the Melbourne Exhibition of 1880. Case Brothers Inc. remained a family business and continued success into the 1960s when it was acquired by Boise Cascade Corporation. The Case family owned a large amount of land in the southeastern section Manchester that is now the Case Mountain Recreational Area. They built a stone bridge across the west end of Case Pond, many stone walls, a chestnut log cabin, and a carriage path that loops from Spring Street to the top of Lookout Mountain and down to Case Pond.

Case Mountain has a vast trail network for hiking and mountain biking, maintained by Manchester Conservation Commission and the Connecticut Forest and Park Association. The terrain is very rocky and hilly, making for somewhat difficult hiking and challenging mountain biking. Bring a trail map and good footwear.

The carriage path, a wide smooth gravel trail with white markings, leads visitors from the Spring Street parking area to the summit of Lookout Mountain (elev. 744 ft) and loops around to Case Pond. Visitors often mistake Lookout Mountain for Case Mountain (elev. 735). The summit of Lookout Mountain has benches and a kiosk and gives visitors a great view of Downtown Manchester, Downtown Hartford, and the hills off to the west.