2013 PURCHASE our DVD - HARD TIMES, HARD WORK VOL.2
"SHASTA DAM, DAM WORKERS AND THOSE DAM KIDS"
$17.25 (inc. tax & shipping)
A special edition to commemorate the 75th Anniversary of the construction of Shasta Dam, and pay tribute to "Those Men of Steel", the thousands of workers who came to labor. This is an entertaining historical video. Second in a series about Shasta Dam. this video is over 70 minutes in length and opens with the dynamic 75th image and ends with the special "ghost" images, both created especially for the this celebration.
From 1938-1945, The Boomtowns of Central Valley, Project City, Summit City and Pine Grove grew to house some of the thousands of men who came to work on the dam. It was after the Great Depression, and having lost everything, unemployed laborers from all over the country came to Shasta County hoping to find work. They came to live and work in an area that had no water... no power..... no roads.... just a landscape filled with manzanita, poison oak, pine trees and red dirt. Dwellings started out as tents in gullies to small houses. Besides the Boomtowns, in Toyon (ranchland purchased by the Government and named after the native bushes) Government Housing was erected providing homes for the skilled workmen of the Bureau of Reclamation. On the hillside and below the construction site, Shasta Dam Village (aka PCI camp) was the housing headquarters erected for Pacific Constructors Inc. workers.
Frank Crowe, Master Builder & Supervisor (PCI) and Frank Lowry, Supervisor (BR) would team up, and bring in their best men, to put this daunting project together - completing it on budget, and within the contract time despite the setbacks that would arise over the span of 7 years - unprecedented flooding in 1940 and the outbreak of WWII. Crowe, designed the Head Tower and cable system to achieve this monumental task. Special in the video is unbelievable 1941 film footage of the Head Tower in operation and looking closely, you will see men "riding" across the Sacramento River by use of the cable system. It also has clips from a 1945 PCI film documentary and memorable interviews taken over the years of Dam workers at their reunions. Stories, narrations & pictures - fill the screen and to add flair, Those Dam Kids share what life was like in the Boomtowns with their stories and photos.
Take a walk back in time to see and hear what life was really like when the Dam was being built - you will be glad you did.......
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