[This appeared in The Spokesman-Review in the fall of 1933, the exact date missing from the clipping. With it were some pictures, including one of "Sam Seaton's landing. . . . The rigging is above a test pit, such as is being dug on the shore of the Columbia to determine the depth of the river bed's granit base. . . . " *]
Test Pits and Core Drilling Are Under Way--Vast Excavation Job Will Be Going Soon--New Towns by Dam Site Spring Up--Size Amazes.
By MARGARET BEAN.
You probably have heard that construction has been begun on the Grand Coulee dam on the Columbia, after years of waiting and working. It has been mentioned a few times in the newspapers.
Nobody seems to know who is paying the bills, whether the state of Washington, the federal government or both. And the dam hardly knows where to send the bills the first of the month, but, nevertheless, they are working. And we motored down to see how hard.
We left sometime in the early dawn of the morning following the record fog when not only people but buses became lost in its blackness. It was still hugging the earth when we departed, but we found what we thought should be the Sunset highway and it seems it was, for several hours later we arrived at Almira.
COULDN'T LOSE SAILOR.
You can't fool a sailor on a foggy morning any more than you can on a dark and stormy night and a sailor was at the the wheel of our "ship"--otherwise Herman F. Edwards, staff photographer of The Spokesman-Review and gob of the high seas during the World war. Either heaven or a sailor's instinct guided him, probably a sailor's instinct.
Driving through our tunnel of fog, with all cars using their headlights, we eventually surmised we had reached country stretches, for we could hear winter wheat growing on each side of the road and the cows chewing their cuds. Something like that, and early birds were gathering up foolish worms that thought they were safe in the fog. We didn't see a farmer during the 100-mile trip to the dam. They must have been indoors, trying to figure a way to get into the new deal.
The highway was in excellent condition all the way to Wilbur, where the building of a new link of road forces a detour between Wilbur and Almira, but it is a good road. Big signs at Wilbur urge you to visit the dam over its highway. Almira counters with other signs to boast of its highway to the dam. And Coulee City would like you to include it in your swing around the Grand Coulee in inspecting the dam site.
NEW TOWNS SPRING UP.
All the little towns that fringe the Columbia have developed a most paternal attitude toward the dam. And, as long as the dam must have a name, each town would like to be a godfather and have the dam for a namesake.
They accord all honor to Senator Dill for what he has accomplished in bringing the dam project to a head, but they don't want it to be known as the Dill dam. The United States is so dill pickle conscious, what with a slice of the famed pickle given away with every sandwich, that Almira, for one, thinks it would be too difficult to wrest the name of Dill from its association with the pickle and transfer it to the dam, although it signifies the name of a United States senator as well as a pickle. And in its place, it suggests the dam be called Almira dam.
At this point, Wilbur gets to its feet and struggles to get the floor. But i refuse to be drawn into the argument.
At Almira, we picked up Joseph B. Mehan, representative of the Columbia basin commission, a genial host, who was to be our guide over the project. Mr. Mehan is a walking information bureau and withstood a days barrage of questions without growing impatient.
HEADQUARTERS AT ALMIRA.
Almira is headquarters at present for Frank A. Banks, federal engineer in charge of construction, and his engineering staff which numbers, to date, some 45 engineers. As a result, Almira has become a boom town. Old buildings bursting at the elbows to hold occupants. New houses. New eating places. No wonder Almira loves the dam.
From Almira, it is 21 miles to the dam site through a level wheat country, which suddenly stops against the horizon and drops hundreds of feet to the Columbia. As the scenic road, and a fine road, winds down the wall of this vast canyon to the Columbia, I scattered the way with superlatives, trying to express something of my impression of the grandeur of the view, inspired by elevation and space, but it can't be done--it gives a sense of vastness that can't be described.
The huge canyon. Its steep walls. The view beyond the coulee walls over rolling hills covered with the soft green of sagebrush. Undoubtedly, the Columbia demanded a lot of elbow room and got it. It made you think that Paul Bunyan and his blue ox had done a bit of work on the Columbia, before he took over his job to plow out Puget sound.
LIVE IN CARAVAN HOMES.
As we dropped closer to the dam site, we could see the fringe of frontier civilization in town sites, above the Columbia and along its shores, and weird traveling caravan homes of people in search of work. In the immensity of the canyon, they seemed like child playhouses.
Mr. Mehan pointed out a white mark on the side of the opposite canyon wall under the scar of loosened rock of a test trench, where men were at work. It was so distant the men looked like ants on the hillside. That marked the top of the low dam, Mr. Mehan explained. It is 145 feet above low water.
We followed the pointing of his finger as he traced the top of the dam, which will reach almost two-thirds of a mile to the side on which we stood, and back up the Columbia in a lake 50 miles long. He explained that it would take four years to build. We didn't wonder at the fact, or that it will cost $63,000,000.
IMAGINATION GIVES UP.
And when he told us that the high dam, a future project, will be 376 feet high and 4872 feet long, with a base 400 feet wide, and take 10 years to build and back up the Columbia to the Canadian border in a lake 150 miles long, and pump overflow water into the Grand Coulee, hundreds of feet above, to make another lake 30 miles long and from one to seven miles wide and from 30 to 165 feet deep, our imagination quit working.
As if the canyon hole were not deep enough bids for excavation of 2,040,000 yards of material were called for November 20. This is but part of the 11,000,000 yards which will eventually be removed above the dam site to arrive at bedrock or about one fifth of the whole amount.
The gravel to be excavated is an area about 400 feet wide and a mile long and varies in depth, according to its position. On the side of the river bed, the depth of the gravel and earth and other deposits is about 250 feet; on the shore of the river in the center of the area approximately 60 feet in depth. The last 10 feet of material, before reaching bedrock, is said to be composed of clay which is like rubber. Beneath this is pure granite which constitutes the bedrock of the dam. It is the job of the excavation contractors to scrape solid granite.
EXCAVATION JOB HUGE.
If you would like this put in the form of a picture--the amount of overburden, otherwise all the material above bedrock, to be removed will cover a block 200 feet square to a height of 1300 feet.
Numerous red and white flags were stuck at different points in the canyon walls--survey markings, which mean things to Mr. Banks and his engineers. If we looked carefully, especially with glasses, we could see telephone linemen high on the walls bringing their lines into the dam site.
Railroad surveyors were picking their way along the topmost ridges. Below we could see men at work on the test pits and drilling core holes and hear the exhaust of engines and the metallic sound of drills. With the Columbia flowing peacefully through its vast canyon and the distant men fussing about its shores and canyon walls, it made me think of a lot of pygmies working on the supine form of a great giant.
TOWN HUGS PRECIPICE.
We came to the unnamed town, one of the numerous town sites that crop up overnight. it hangs by its eyebrows on the outside of the road, with its front doors opening on the road and its back doors opening into the wide open spaces, the first step hundreds of feet below. It won't be bothered with any lawns to cut or back yards to clean up. However, its city fathers ought to urge sleep-walkers to sleep in parachutes, as well as pajamas. The parachutes might match the pajamas, if the sleep-walkers are fussy.
Opposite and up a short road is the Grand Coulee town site--it looks more comfortable, with something beside air to sit on.
At the dam site proper there is a thriving community, but orders have been issued by the basin commission, telling everybody to vacate by midnight November 16, unless connected with construction work of the dam. They aren't so happy there, but everybody lives on wheels, so it won't be difficult to bedroom and bath and walk.
"HOT DOGS" EVERYWHERE.
In covered wagon days, towns clustered about the corner saloon. In the Coulee they cluster about "hot dog" parlors. From all the hot dog emporiums we saw I have a notion it will take as many hot dogs as sacks of cement to build the dam. However, to my knowledge there is no mention of a hot dog in the dam specifications.
Mr. Mehan introduced us to Al Meyers, the dam site's pioneer and its mayor. He is proprietor of "Al's Dam" cafe and has a house on wheels with a doorbell. Either Al made the dam famous or the dam made Al famous. At any rate, Al and the dam are synonymous. Everybody who knows the dam, knows Al.
Within a distance of four miles of the dam site there are probably 500 people living, hoping to make a living out of the work at the dam site. But 150 of these are engaged in actual construction work on the dam. Ramsey & Co., digging the core pits, have about 72 men on the job and Lynch Brothers, contractors, have the rest. Mr. Mehan introduced us to E. D. Rhoades, foreman for Lynch Brothers.
SINKING CORE HOLES.
"Last summer, when the roads were deep in dust, they called him 'Dusty' Rhoades," Mr. Mehan explained, "but now that he has got his drills into solid granite, they call him 'Rocky' Rhoades." The diamond drillers have dug 27 core holes of the 52 they are to do.
Mr. Rhoades took us into the "jewelry shop" where his men handle the drill diamonds and set them in the bits. He poured a vial of black diamonds into his hand.
"These diamonds are valued as high as $175 a carat and cost about $3700," Mr. Rhoades explained. He didn't offer to let me hold them, although his legs were longer than mine and he could run faster.
Diamond drill "jewelers" set these diamonds in the bits that are used. Mr. Rhoades has put one of his drills to a depth of 800 feet, with 650 of these feet driven through solid granite.
Once drilled, these cores are brought to the surface, some in lengths as long as five feet and about two inches in diameter and the entire contents of the core hole placed in boxes, especially made.
TEST PITS HIT GRANITE. *
The test pits, being dug by Rumsey & Co., are like wells, timbered as they are sunk and driven in some cases, to a depth of 238 feet.
From the core specimens and test pits, Mr. Banks is able to determine the geological formation of the base of the river bed on which he will anchor the dam. To date, no evidence has been unearthed to indicate that the formation underlying the Columbia is anything but solid granite.
Work never stops at the dam. In shifts, work goes on day and night. Nor does the ferry ever stop. Charon never had such a busy time on the River Styx ferry as Sam Seaton on his ferry. Fortune has come to Sam Seaton's door.
We met Mr. Rumsey at a most opportune time. It was just before the dinner gong of his camp rang--we didn't plan it but we might have.
COOK IS RESOURCEFUL.
"Won't you have dinner with us?" he asked. He was out of luck, we would. There were a dozen contractors there that day, getting ready to bid on excavation work, and Mr. Rumsey acted as their host also.
McKee, the cook, only smiled when Mr. Rumsey brought in a dozen extra for dinner. There ought to be medals for cooks like McKee. Nobody will ever forget his bountiful table.
When we came out of the Columbia canyon and climbed back up the hill, we drove down the Grand Coulee, one of the world's geological marvels, 25 miles to the Dry Falls. Once upon a time--
"When you were a tadpole and I was a fish,
In the Paleozoic times * * * "
nature is supposed to have shoved a great pack of ice across the channel of the Columbia, as it flowed down the Grand Coulee and to have hurled it over the hill into its present river bed.
MIGHTIER THAN NIAGARA. **
And now, looking up at the great black walls of sheer basaltic rock, 1000 feet high, carved by the waters of time, we ride down this prehistoric river bed on a fine highway to the Dry falls that were mightier than those that thunder over Niagara falls, before the Columbia met up with an exasperating glacier that refused to be turned from its course.
It seems rather too bad. Think of the business we could have done in honeymooners had the Columbia continued to thunder over the Dry falls and outdo Niagara 40 to one! We probably would never have heard of Niagara, any more than Niagara has heard of the Dry falls.
And when the high dam is completed once again the old river bed will be under water, with Steamboat rock, midway down the coulee, a mass of basalt more than 700 feet high and almost a mile long, once again an island.
Undoubtedly the world has changed a bit since, as I said before, "When you were a tadpole and i was a fish." And seems to continue to change. Man is doing fairly well since he learned to use his stone hammer.
* The ferry was the Grant County ferry, operated by Sam Seaton.--CousinSam
** More recent geological discoveries have shown that the Grand Coulee was not carved out over a long period by the Columbia, but rather in a fairly short time by floods from the collapse of Lake Missoula during the ice age.--CousinSam
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