WSP10089

• File Number: 8220.200.05.A
• Description: Hoover Dam/Lake Mead/Boulder Canyon Project
• Basin: Colorado Mainstem
• Date: 1/1/1950
• Title: The Story of Hoover Dam: Conservation Bulletin No. 9
• Water Supply Pro - Doc Type: Publication

ir
:~i ~
'"
I
!~.
'}
:~
:i~

~

~

~

:;

!i

;-~i " i " ,
'1
<,
,.>;:-
~';r.

~

,

.~&

:!

t

Ii

!l'

tt' 'fr-;t,;
jIJ"
I!J ,.
~ ~
~ g
III!
!!!;o ~ 'llI
" Ill!
~
[:f}
III
ill ~
a

iIi!
.
~:il" ~
~...,
.ID
oJ
i

~lJ1
)".::' -;;:;
~

iIIII
~iII".'
I

~

II

..

e

~

'!:'

'"

~~
l'l
~II"""

&

lit

III

~

..
~ ~
il'

III
~

I!ll

'II
,

Arizona intake towers as seen from surface of reservoir. Water surface at
elevation 884. Bottom 0/ intake tower.~ at elevation 894.

24

r/J

" U'
~ :1..
~
~<li'
ill
.
i

>!l'!.rI
II!
~-
~
i!IlI
.Jll ~
.'P},;rJIIi 'IlI_
L ~ q

n 176:1

The dam towered 726.4 feet above bedrock-equivalent to the height of a
GO-story skyscraper; it had a base thickness of 660 feet-equal to the length of
two ordinary residential blocks; a crest thickness of 45 feet---equaI to the
width of a four-lane highway; and a crest length of 1,244 feet-nearly a
quarter of a mile.
The Government's contract had allowed Six Companies, Inc., 7 years to
complete the work, but with efficient personnel and the finest of equipment, the
contract was completed 2 years ahead of schedule.
The speed with which Hoover Dam was completed bears testimony to the
ability and experience of a combination of grand old construction men.
One of the master strokes in the construction of Hoover Dam was the
cooling of the concrete. Left to itself, the vast bulk of the dam would have
taken more than a century to cool off from the heat created by the setting of the
cement, shrinking as it cooled, and cracking as it shrank. The solution was
to build the dam in pierlike blocks and to cool the placed concrete by running
ice.cold water through pipes imbedded in the blocks. As each block con-
tracted and left gaps between itself and adjacent blocks, engineers pumped
the gaps full of special grout concrete, making the structure monolithic-of
one piece.
Hoover Dam was done. A permanent asset had been added to the Nation's
productive economy. The years of study, the plans and the blueprints had
materialized into lasting 'structural achievement. And within a few short
years, more quickly than expected by its designers, Hoover Dam amply
demonstrated its economic and social values to the Southwest and to the
Nation at large.

Bo,,~lder City~ l\Tpvada

A major argument against construction of a dam in Black Canyon was
the complete absence of facilities to house construction workers. None knew
better than the engineers who had conducted the preliminary survey in the
canyon that the problem of suitable living quarters was a real one. A con-
struction camp in the vicinity of the canyon was out of question. For in
that area was neither soil, grass, nor trees. In summer, waves of heat swept
over the gorge as blasts from a furnace. A construction camp, here, would
invite unbearable living conditions.
So the planners set out to find a site on which to build a town that would
afford all the modern comforts prevailing in most American communities.
Thus, Boulder City was born out of sheer necessity.
In some respects the town is as remarkable as the dam. Certain it iS1
that without the care and skill that went into planning this modern desert
community, there could never have been erected, in so short a time, so stu-
pendous a structure as Hoover Dam.

A pilot's view 0/ Hoover Dam. ~

861703'--50----5

25