Duck, Donald (Don) J., Oral History Interview
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ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEWS DONALD (DON) J. DUCK 1996 Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë STATUS OF INTERVIEWS: OPEN FOR RESEARCH Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë Interviews Conducted and Edited by: Brit Allan Storey Senior Historian Bureau of Reclamation Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë Oral History Program Bureau of Reclamation Denver, Colorado Edited and Printed: 2007-2008 SUGGESTED CITATION: DUCK, DONALD (DON) J., ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW. Transcript of tape-recorded Bureau of Reclamation Oral History Interviews conducted by Brit Allan Story, Senior Historian, Bureau of Reclamation, in 1996, in Conifer, Colorado. Edited by Brit Allan Storey. Repository for the record copy of the interview transcript is the National Archives and Records Administration in College Park, Maryland. Record copies of this transcript are printed on 20 lb., 100% cotton, archival quality paper. All other copies are printed on normal duplicating paper. i Table of Contents Table of Contents ............................. i Statement of Donation .......................xxv Brief Chronology of the Life of Donald (Don) J. Duck .................................. xxvii Introduction ............................... xxix Oral History Interviews of Donald (Don) J. Duck ....1 Born in Sanford and Raised in Terre Haute, Indiana..........................1 Attended Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology ................................1 Started College in February 1949 ...........2 Enlisted in the Air Force During the Korean War ................................2 Stationed at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Alaska ................................2 Went Back to College at Family’s Insistence . 2 Attended College on the G.I. Bill...........2 Graduated in Civil Engineering in 1959 ......2 Spent Time in Alaska Doing Survey Work....3 Job Opportunities upon Graduation .........3 Interview with Bureau of Reclamation.......3 Offered a GS-7 Position ..................4 June of 1959 Moved to Flaming Gorge Damsite ................................4 Just Setting up Camp in Dutch John.........4 Worked in Construction Inspection .........5 Required Scaling above Some Work ........5 “In fact, construction safety kind of began there at Flaming Gorge, Glen Canyon. .” . 6 Oral history of Donald (Don) J. Duck ii Work organized into three shifts........... 6 Selected to be a lead construction inspector . 7 “No one of the three of us really had much dam experience. Naturally, mine was zero. .”.............................. 7 Met Roscoe Granger, Field Engineer at Flaming Gorge.......................... 7 Gene Walton Was Construction Engineer at Flaming Gorge................... 7 “So you had the Davis Dam group, and then Roscoe with his Monticello Dam group, which is true of every project that I ever worked on, you had these different people that were drawn in from other projects, and you make the mix again, and go on and build . .” ........... 8 “At that time, those of us who got involved . .were really getting in on the last of the big dam building era. .”.......... 8 “It was a great time to be with the Bureau of Reclamation if you were interested in dams, dam construction, large projects . .”.............................. 9 Concrete Development in Reclamation...... 9 Concrete quality control issues at Flaming Gorge .............................. 10 Fluctuations in Sand Moisture at Flaming Gorge .............................. 10 Enos Ryland Was Sent to Look into the Sand Moisture Control Problem......... 11 “. once we got Denver convinced that it was a sand moisture problem, then they made the contractor get it under control. .” .............................. 11 “But everybody’s objective was to get the best concrete we could in that dam . .” . 12 Bureau of Reclamation History Program iii “We never had any problems with money . the water conservancy districts . had a lot more problems with funding and with money than any of the power projects did . .” ...........................13 Relationship of Projects with the Chief Engineer ...............................14 Grant Bloodgood Became Chief Engineer ...15 “. .we took six-inch cores and some eighteen- inch cores . [and] a couple of these core samples . .We sent them to the Denver lab in a gunny sack. You know, it wasn’t a core, it was loose material. .” .............................16 Contractor Was a Joint Venture of Kiewit, M-K, and Utah Construction ............17 Doug Baker Was the Contractor’s Representative...................17 Peter Kiewit Came out to Inspect the Project ...............................17 “. Pete Kiewit had gotten up a couple of hours earlier, he got his own pickup, and when Doug caught up with him, he had the back end of the pickup full of rubber gloves that had been thrown around. .” ...............................18 “Doug, assigned one of his principal superintendents . They followed us around, and reported on what we were doing, . on a twenty-four-hour basis. I don’t think I ever saw it get that bad anyplace else. But once the problem got straightened out, as far as concrete control was concerned, why, it kind of reverted back to normal relations. .” ...............................19 Oral history of Donald (Don) J. Duck iv I always had . final product in mind, and you had a spec as a guide, but you didn’t necessarily need to follow the letter of the specification to get the result that you wanted . .” .................... 20 “We wanted a good product, a Reclamation- quality product. .” ............. 20 “But the relations get rocky, depending on a number of different things. One thing, if a contractor’s losing money, you have more difficulty getting the product you want . .” ...................... 21 Shifts rotated each two weeks ............ 21 Excavation at Flaming Gorge Dam for the Arch Dam.......................... 22 “. the shape of the keyways and the abutments were of extreme importance. .” . 23 Laying out Blasts During Preparation of the Keyways....................... 23 When Ernie Schultz Retired and Merlin Copen Took over There Was a Change in Concrete Dam Design Philosophy at Reclamation.................... 25 Louie Puls was more conservative than Schultz and Copen ..................... 25 Ernie Schultz and Merlin Copen thinned up Yellowtail Dam quite a bit......... 25 “I followed Roscoe Granger until he retired. .” .............................. 26 “The preparation of the foundation, the shaping of the foundation, the maintaining of the quality of the rock. .” ........... 26 How Reclamation and the Contractor Assure That the Quantities Figures for the Contract Are Correct............. 27 Office Engineering Work................ 28 Bureau of Reclamation History Program v Blasting Work.........................28 How Reclamation Passed Information from Shift to Shift.........................30 Getting Around the Damsite ..............30 Inspection Crew at Flaming Gorge.........33 “. as the work progressed, the size of the crews would go up to significantly more than . in the early stages. .”.....33 Roscoe Granger........................34 “He trusted me, and I got by with some things, working for Roscoe Granger, that he’d have fired anybody else on the spot, but I did what I thought I had to do. .” . 35 The Staff Stationed at Grand Coulee Wasn’t Thrilled to Have a Big Construction Project like the Third Powerhouse on the Doorstep .......................37 Setting up Coordination among the Contractor, Construction Staff, and Local Operations Staff at Grand Coulee.............37 “For years and years, the Bureau of Reclamation had a superior position to the Department. .”.................39 “I just know that Reclamation occupied the seventh floor of the Interior Building, and Interior just did not mess with Reclamation in those years. .”.....39 Another Coordination Incident During Relocation of the Switchyard .......39 “And that was the end of the coordinator. .” ...............................40 “. there was a hell of a friction between the Ephrata office, who I think had somebody that they thought should have Roscoe Granger’s job. .” .........40 Accident While Dismantling the Old Switchyard Oral history of Donald (Don) J. Duck vi Towers........................ 41 Roscoe Granger Retired from the Grand Coulee Job ........................... 42 “When Ellis Armstrong came in as Commissioner, he did away with the title Chief Engineer . and there was an effort to de-emphasize the control . of the Denver Office . .”............ 43 “. the way the field worked with the Denver office didn’t change at all. .”..... 43 Ted Mermel.......................... 44 “The nearest thing that I remember about Ted was his involvement in moving to those big units at Grand Coulee. I think he had significant influence . .”.......... 45 Oil-filled Transmission Cable at Grand Coulee Later Replaced .................. 45 Gene Walton Came to Flaming Gorge from Davis Dam..................... 46 “Gene was, I guess, more of a perfectionist than most anybody that I’ve worked for, as far as heavy construction was concerned. .”............................. 46 “Flaming Gorge has a number of, looked like miniature dams, downstream from the dam, that were a product of Gene Walton’s concern about those shale seams. .”..................... 47 “. at Flaming Gorge we had a number of Australian engineers that were assigned up there, in training. .” .......... 48 “. Gene [Walton] came out of that Snowy Mountain [Project] . Then Davis Dam, then Flaming Gorge. .”.......... 49 Meets Roscoe Granger at Dutch John...... 50 Russell Borden Was Chief Inspector at Flaming Bureau of Reclamation History Program vii Gorge and Had Been Involved