Hoover Dam Research Paper

The Hoover Dam was created almost 80 years ago during the Great Depression. It symbolizes what man can do when there is a severe need. It is located on the Arizona and Nevada border, within the Black Canyon on the Colorado River near Las Vegas, (Gale Group). It controls the Colorado River and runs through seven Western states. When it was first built it was considered the biggest dam in the United States. Today, it is the second biggest in the United States and the third in the world, (Hoover Dam Facts). The Hoover Dam was one of the United States biggest engineering challenges for Six Companies that banded together to help with the construction. It was a dangerous job working on the dam, men were paid $.50 to $1.25 a day for their hard work, …show more content…
The men were paid .50 cents to $1.25 a day. Even the hiring was hard because Six Companies was highly advised to give the work to Veterans of the Spanish-American War and World War I. They were not allowed to hired Chinese workers. African Americans were supposed to be employed, but the actual numbers were very low. Mostly, Native American were given the most dangerous jobs which were to remove the loose rocks from the canyon walls with dynamite and jackhammers, they are only safely being ropes as they went up and down the walls, (Nix). There were 96 deaths during construction due equipment failure or rocks falling or some other problem. There were many more in Boulder City from lack of sanitation, heat exposure, and sickness. The construction workers favorite labrador dog mascot, “Mix” died one day while he was sleeping under a truck and was run over. The workers put up a memorial for the dog which was hammered into the solid rock on the cliff on the side of the dam, (Hoover …show more content…
It is a concrete arch-gravity type dam. This means that the water load is carried by both gravity action and horizontal arch action. The maximum water pressure at the base of the dam is 45,000 pounds per square foot. The crest length is 1244 feet with the crest being 45 feet. The volume of the concrete is 4.25 million cubic yards. The Hoover Dam stops the 550 miles of Lake Mead along the coastline and is 110 miles long with the depth of 500 feet. Over 8.5 millions pounds of dynamite was used to blast the foundation for the dam. The reinforcement steel was 45 million pounds. The gates and valves are 21,670,000 pounds. They also used 88,000,000 pounds of paste steel and outlet pipes. There were 18 million pounds of structure and steel used. Other metal work was 5,300,000 pounds. More than 5 million barrels of concrete was a daily demand for the construction of the dam which was from 7,500 to 10,800 barrels, (Colorado River & Hoover