A HISTORY OF THE HOOVER DAM
Past president Barry Hiscox continues the Letter from America series
Continuing my LFAs, I wanted to delve deep into the details regarding the construction of the iconic Hoover Dam over the Colorado River at the intersection of the US states of Nevada and Arizona.
Technically, the Hoover Dam is classed as a concrete arch-gravity dam, and is located in the Black Canyon of the Colorado River. This mammoth structure was built between 1931 and 1936, providing employment during The Great Depression, involving thousands of workers and costing more than 100 lives. Originally named the Boulder Dam, it was renamed the Hoover Dam by Congress in 1947.
In 1928, Congress authorised the project to build a dam across the Colorado River, which would control floods, provide irrigation and produce hydro-electric power.
The winning bid was from a consortium of six named companies, initially formed by general contractors Utah Construction Company of Ogden, Utah and Morrison Knudson.
The ultimate six company consortium comprised:
- 30% - Henry J. Kaiser Co. of Oakland CA & Bechtel Corporation of San Francisco (Bechtel Kaiser)
- 20% - McDonald and Kahn of Los Angeles, California
- 20% - Utah Construction Company of Ogden, Utah
- 10% - Morrison-Knudson of Boise, Idaho
- 10% - Pacific Bridge Company of Portland, Oregon
- 10% - J.F.Shea Co. of Portand, Oregon
The consortium leadership was comprised of W.H. Wattis of Utah Construction (president), W.H. Bechtel of Bechtel Kaiser (first vice president), E.O. Wattis of Utah Construction (second vice president), Charles A. Shea of J.F. Shea (secretary, Felix Kahn of McDonald and Kahn (treasurer) and K.K. Bechtel of BechtelKaiser (assistant secretary–treasurer).
The six companies were incorporated as a joint venture in 1930 to work on a bid for the project.
Eventually, and because of the size of the project, only three bids were received by the US secetary of the interior, who accepted the above mentioned six companies’ bid of US$48,890,955 (equivalent to US$789m in 2023). The accepted bid was $5m lower than the next bid of the three (a bid spread of almost 10%).
The six company board selected Morrison Knudson as general construction superintendant of the Boulder Dam construction. He hired every man who was employed on the project and was on site every day of the week until project completion.
Work commenced June 1931 and the six companies completed the project two years ahead of schedule in 1935. The dam was dedicated in September 1935 but it required a further nine years (1938 – 1947) to fix serious leaks by supplemental grout curtain carried out under relative secrecy.
The government was to provide all necessary materials, with the contractor to prepare the site and build the dam. The bid documents comprised 100 pages of text and 76 drawings, produced by the Bureau of Reclamation. A $2m (equivalent to $32.3m in 2023) bid bond was required to accompany each bid, with the winner to post a $5m ($81.7m in 2023) performance bond. The successful contractor would have seven years to build the dam before invocation of penalties.
Fast-forward to the modern day, and the dam faces new challenges. The effects of years of severe drought and increasing temperatures due to undeniable climate change are striking along the shores of Lake Mead, upstream of the Hoover Dam, where a growing ring of whiteish strata increasingly reveals the drop in level of water in the lake/reservoir.
The level of the largest reservoir in the country held back by it has dropped by 140ft, leaving the reservoir just 37% full of its maximum capacity, heading rapidly to an official shortage brought about by a combination of climate change and excessive overuse of water by an increasing population in such places as Las Vegas, which are heavily dependent upon this source.