Engineer Memoirs _____________________________________________________________________
We always had interesting times down there because it's such a very rustic area. Oneida,
Tennessee, was 10 or 12 miles away. I remember the groundbreaking for Leatherwood Ford
bridge. Senator Baker came down. We were to have the groundbreaking down at the bridge.
It rained heavily the night before and we couldn't get to the bridge by auto, so we had it up in
a local high school auditorium. They put up the flags and everything else. It was cascading
rain outside, the auditorium was full, and Senator Baker and I gave our talks. We took our
spades outside of the school for the groundbreaking--the bridge site was two or three miles
away.
Another interesting time was the groundbreaking for the Bandy Creek visitor site, the ranger
station and so forth. The locals brought a mule with a plow. The local congressman and I
were to stand behind the mule and the plow, and we would break ground that way.
I remember getting behind the mule, whose name was Sam also, and the congressman looked
over to me with all these photographers and people around him and said, "What do we do,
anyway? How do we get this mule moving?" I said, quietly, "Congressman, I don't know,
but then, the people here don't expect me to know." [Laughter]
So, he had a problem. I don't think he was elected at the next election. I'm not sure if it was
because people recognized he didn't know how to drive a mule.
Q:
That could have been part of it, though. [Laughter]
A:
I always enjoyed going back there because our Corps folks there really loved the land and the
project. It was just a wonderful project for anybody who really liked nature and the
environment.
I remember Jim Spears was there with Nashville District working on the project, and he was
quite an artist. He did paintings of birds that were lovely, really terrific. This was his country.
It was a labor of love for all those people, where they were acquiring real estate, working the
project, or whatever. I mean, they were doing something for their world, and they really
loved it.
Q:
Are there other civil works projects of note?
A:
Yes, I ought to talk some about the Gallipolis Locks and Dam project. Gallipolis, located in
the middle Ohio, with one 600-foot- and one 360-foot-long lock was the biggest bottleneck
for barge traffic on the river. Located on a bend, it was also the most hazardous. During my
time in the Ohio River Division there was considerable activity--planning, design, model
testing at the Waterways Experiment Station, testimony, congressional visits--revolving
about modernizing Gallipolis to provide new 1,200-foot and 600-foot lock chambers. A new
organization, DINAMO, came into being.
DINAMO brought many leaders, government and political representatives, to Gallipolis to
view firsthand the problem and to solicit support for the preferred solution. I rather thought
there was an effective partnership of private industry and government in this endeavor. It led
to authorization and construction of the badly needed replacement locks.
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