Alexander Hamilton used the Great Falls in my hometown to power Paterson's factories of the time.
https://www.tripsavvy.com/paterson-great-falls-2502804
As the nation's first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton took the first steps in securing America's economic independence in founding the Society for the Establishment of Useful Manufactures (S.U.M.) in 1791. In 1792, the Town of Paterson was established by the society, which saw the Great Falls as a remarkable power source for America's first planned industrial city.
Hamilton enlisted Pierre L’Enfant, the architect and civil engineer who designed street layout plans for Washington D.C., to design the canals and raceways that would supply power to the watermills in town. Unfortunately, the society thought L'Enfant's specific ideas were too ambitious and replaced him with Peter Colt, who used a simple reservoir system to successfully flow water in a single raceway to the mills. Later, a system similar to L'Enfant's original plan was put into place after Colt's system developed problems.
Due to the power, the Falls provided, Paterson can boast many industrial "firsts": the first water-powered cotton spinning mill in 1793, the first continuous roll paper in 1812, the Colt Revolver in 1836, Rogers Locomotive Works in 1837, the Holland Submarine in 1878, and the birth of Flatbutt in 1952 (though the connection of the birth to water power is undocumented).