#1
THE HOOVER DAMArchitects
° Gordon Kaufmann
° Henry J. Kaiser
Head engineer ° Francis Trenholm Crowe
Constructed
° between
1931 and 1936, during the Great Depression .
Facts
° The dam is located on the border between Nevada and Arizona.
° The dam cost $49 million to build.
° Hoover Dam is 726 feet (221 metres) high and 1,244 feet (379 metres) long at the crest. It contains 4,400,000 cubic yards (3,360,000 cubic metres) of concrete. Four reinforced-concrete intake towers located above the dam divert water from the reservoir into huge steel pipes called penstocks. The water, after falling some 500 feet (150 metres) through the pipes to a
hydroelectric power plant in the base of the dam, turns 17 Francis-type vertical hydraulic
turbines, which rotate a series of
electric generators that have a total power
capacity of 2,080 megawatts.