ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEWS HAROLD G. ARTHUR 1994 AND 1995 Denver, Colorado Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë STATUS OF INTERVIEWS: OPEN FOR RESEARCH Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë Interviews Conducted by: Brit Allan Storey Senior Historian Bureau of Reclamation Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë Ë Oral History Program Bureau of Reclamation Original Printing: 2000 Reformatted and Revised by Brit Storey, January 2010 SUGGESTED CITATION: ARTHUR, HAROLD G. ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW. Transcript of tape-recorded Bureau of Reclamation Oral History Interviews conducted by Brit Allan Story, senior historian, Bureau of Reclamation, during 1994 and 1995, in Denver, Colorado. Transcription by Barbara Heginbottom Jardee, Jardee Transcription, Tucson, Arizona. 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........................................................ xiii Introduction .................................................................xv Oral History Interview..........................................................1 Born in Lead, South Dakota ...............................................1 I Wanted to Be an Engineer or an Attorney....................................1 My Father Worked for the Homestake Mine and I Was Given a Summer Job There Because I Was Planning to Go to College......................................1 I Went on the Road Looking for a Job ........................................2 At Casper, Wyoming, I Applied for Work on the Casper-Alcova Project ............2 Went to Work for the South Dakota State Highway Commission ..................2 Offered Job by Bureau of Reclamation.......................................3 Working for the Homestake Mine Company...................................3 “Cleaning Up” or Scraping the Plates of the Amalgam in the Homestake Gold Mill....4 Worked in Refining the Gold...............................................4 One Summer Worked Digging Water Ditches .................................5 Father Didn’t Want Him to Work Underground ................................5 The Roads of South Dakota in 1935-1936 .....................................8 Inspecting Gravel Work on State Roads ......................................8 Working on the Casper-Alcova Project......................................10 “. .in those days all those jobs were filled with graduate engineers. .” ...........10 Working on a Survey on the Casper-Alcova Project............................11 Transferred to Work on Construction Inspection ..............................11 Government Housing on the Casper-Alcova Project............................11 “. they started charging us a dollar-and-a-half a month for rent. .”.............12 Assisted with Office Engineering Responsibilities .............................12 Working on Inspection of Work ...........................................12 “One reason we had to live out there . .”....................................13 Inspecting Dam Foundation Work ..........................................14 Removing Large Boulders from the Cut-Off Trench ...........................15 “. he bid $7.50 a cubic yard for excavating . Now that’s the kind of a price that would be bid today . .” .................................................16 “Batching” out at the Work Site ...........................................17 “Was that a good job [with the Bureau of Reclamation] for those days?” ...........18 Harold G. Arthur ii Hours Worked on the Casper-Alcova Project.................................19 “How did reclamation’s inspectors interact so that there was continuity . .? ........20 A Problem with the Contractor over Following Specifications....................20 “He said, ‘if you had made the wrong decision, I’d still back you a hundred percent” . 23 Another Example of Mr. Beemer’s Management Style..........................25 Takes Civil Service Exam for Junior Civil Engineer Position ....................26 Leaves Reclamation to Work for the Forest Service............................26 Reclamation Couldn’t Give a Civil Service Rating to Keep Him..................27 The Conclusion of the Story about Boulders in the Foundation Area ...............28 Expresses Concern about Commissioner Daniel Beard’s Comments at ICOLD Meeting in 1994 ...........................................................29 Move to the Forest Service in 1937 .........................................29 Does Transportation Planning for the Forest Service in Missoula, Montana .........29 Decides the Forest Service Job in Missoula Isn’t Going Anywhere................33 Plans Trip to Denver to See the Bureau of Reclamation but Stops at Regional Forest Service Office in Ogden..................................................33 Takes Course in Soil Mechanics...........................................34 Makes a Trip to Denver to Try and Get Back into the Bureau of Reclamation .......34 Went to Work for the Earth Dams Section ...................................34 Felt He Wasn’t Advanced Properly in Ogden.................................35 Goes Back to Work for Reclamation........................................36 Office Was in the New Customs House in Denver.............................37 Working Conditions at the Bureau of Reclamation in 1941 ......................37 First Supervisor in Denver Was Frank (F. F.) Smith............................38 Assistant Branch Chief Assigned Work .....................................38 Bought New House in the Spring of 1942 ....................................39 The Effects of World War II on the Bureau of Reclamation......................39 Decides with Wife to Seek Employment in a Job Which Will Be Deferred During the Draft in World War II..................................................40 Sought a War Service Transfer to Work for the Consolidated Vultee Aircraft Corporation ...............................................................40 Reclamation Opposed a War Service Transfer ................................41 Move to Fort Worth, Texas...............................................42 Worked on Development of the XB-36 Intercontinental Bomber..................42 “. nobody knew but what Europe would fall, and the United States would be fighting Hitler from this country. .” ........................................42 How B-36 Design Occurred...............................................43 Design Work at the Bureau of Reclamation Was Checked and Rechecked ..........43 Design Work on the B-36 Was Turned into Reality on the Mock-up in a Matter of Days ...............................................................44 Promotion into Supervisory Responsibility ...................................45 Bureau of Reclamation History Program iii Took Courses Through Texas A&M ........................................45 Working Conditions While Designing the B-36...............................46 Design Considerations in Building the B-36..................................47 “. the thrust of the structural engineer is to make it strong enough, but don’t make it too strong. .” .......................................................48 Lab Testing the Strength of a Part..........................................48 “Avoid Verbal Orders” ..................................................49 “. I went out to look at the guaranteed housing, and my wife just threw up her hands—it was Quonsets. .” ................................................51 Writes to Reclamation about Returning to Denver .............................54 Moves Back to Denver ..................................................55 Reclamation Was Gearing up to Build Projects to Help Employ Military Men .......56 Rapid Promotions in Denver..............................................56 Works on Boysen Dam ..................................................57 Cachuma Dam and Innovations in its Design .................................57 “So that was my first field trip for the Bureau of Reclamation–a rather significant one. .” ...............................................................61 Recollections about the Riverton Project .....................................63 Cachuma Project .......................................................63 Creates Staged Construction for Cachuma Dam...............................64 Design of Small Dams–a Publication........................................65 Requirements for Different Types of Dams...................................65 Auburn Dam Was Originally Proposed as an Earth Dam ........................65 Directs Study of Concrete Dam at Auburn Because of Anticipated Environmental Damage of an Earth Dam..................................................66 At Anchor Dam Reclamation Designed a Concrete Dam and an Earth Dam and Let Bids on the Two Designs Determine Which Was Built ..........................66 Competitive Spirit Between Concrete and Earth Dam Designers ..................67 “. the majority of dams, by far, of the Bureau of Reclamation, are earth dams . because of their economy” ................................................67 “So if I got into an organization, I wanted it to be one that was run by civil engineers, not by mechanical or electrical engineers. .” ...............................68 Assigned to Coordinate Between Reclamation and the International Boundary and Water