President Franklin Delano Roosevelt toured Southern Tier communities in New York that were impacted by the powerful 1935 floods. That 1935 flood, and its impacts to Binghamton and other communities, was one of the major floods of the time that played a large role in the ultimate crafting and passing of the Flood Control Act of 1936 that authorized the construction of Whitney Point Dam along with hundreds of other flood risk management works across the country.