Hauntin' the Quabbin by Sean Cole (2006)

This hour-long documentary has everything you need for good radio: old people with heavy accents, something you cannot see, and a question that no one ever thinks about.  Where does Boston get its drinking water?  As it turns out, the answer is that  the town of Dana, Massachusetts was flooded in order to create the Quabbin Reservoir.  Hauntin’ the Quabbin’ gives former residents and their families an opportunity to reflect on the relationship between community and place, and all that was lost.  There isn’t a fight about urban development or an environmental scandal driving the piece.  Instead, it’s a quiet story about what used to be and how we should honor those things,  a window into a dying tradition that relishes in the way that experience becomes lore. This hour-long documentary has everything you need for good radio: old people with heavy accents, something you cannot see, and a question that no one ever thinks about.  Where does Boston get its drinking water?  As it turns out, the answer is that  the town of Dana, Massachusetts was flooded in order to create the Quabbin Reservoir.  Hauntin’ the Quabbin’ gives former residents and their families an opportunity to reflect on the relationship between community and place, and all that was lost.  There isn’t a fight about urban development or an environmental scandal driving the piece.  Instead, it’s a quiet story about what used to be and how we should honor those things,  a window into a dying tradition that relishes in the way that experience becomes lore.