The Saint Paul globe., 1902-09-29
this half of the improvement to $685.
INTERIOR OF LOCK AND DAM.

this half Of the Improvement to $685.
900.
The site of this work is just above
the Marshall avenue bridge. The Sec
ond dam and lock will be constructed
several miles below, near the mouth
of Minnehaha creek, and, given the
same conditions of river bed and the
same prices for labor and materials,
will cost approximately the same
amount. The congressional appropria-
tion for the two dams and locks was
$1,250,000, but this was made on the
estimate of 1895, when labor and steel
were far lower than at present, and Ia
Dor and steel are among the controll-
ling factors in the cost of the work.
Should the lower dam require as long
to build, the summer of 1909 will have
opened before the first boat from st.
Louis or New Orleans will be able to
load with timber and flour at the mills
of Minneapolis. The unexpected length
of time consumed in the construction
has been due to two causes. The dila-
toriness of the steel founders in deliv-
ering the materials used in the gates
and valves of the lock is responsible
for many months Of the delay. But for
the time already lost in waiting upon
the convenience of the steel trust, the
engineers would be able to report the
upper dam completed by the close of
1903.
The Fight With the River.
But the chief obstacle to rapid con-
struction is the Father Of Waters him
self. Day by day he battles with the
men whom he sees patiently and stead
lily erecting machine that will con-
vert him to the base uses of commerce.
The canyon of the Mississippi above
Fort Smelling has been cut by the re-
cession Of the Falls of st. Anthony
through bed of soft sandstone. The
river bottom is of the same material,
and this, to a considerable depth, is
full of water-bearing seams. These
have doubled the labor and cost of
building a structure designed perma-
nently to control the river level. Such
q structure must be water tight or it
must not be at all. A single leak may
mean that in some spring freshet five
or ten or twenty years hence, the angry
Mississippi, working through subterra-
mean channels the ruin it is powerless
to wreak upon the great breastwork
above, shall brush the dam aside in a
moment and send down flood to re-
p6dL OIl LHG llclS OI 81. raul TIE SCENES
of Johnstown or Galveston. This is the
phantom that haunts the men the gov
ernment has set to build these works.
For almost every foot of excavation
within the cofferdams has opened un-
derground veins through which the
water rushes to hamper all attempts at
laying foundations of concrete below
the river level.
Thus tho CIV f6o+ EN0+I
Hennepin blessed resists the effort of
man to curb its flow; now it spoils the
work done and makes 1t to be done
anew; again, it calls a halt upon op-
erations in hand until the thrush of the
water can be overcome by the great
pumps that labor day and night; at all
times it is there, stealthily, insistent,
treacherous, cunning; and it says to it's
enemies: you may be the agents of
the richest government on earth, but
before you tie me up with that har-
ness of stone and steel, will give you
such a run for your money as you
never dreamed Of"
Uncle Sans Engineers.
The duty of planting these water
proof barriers across the channel of
the Mississippi has been entrusted to
the SHSiHSSI COIpS VI tie CHlLSu OldtCS
army. When the government at Wash
ington has some easy work to give out
something with a lot of profit about
it-the thing is let by contract, the
contract goes to the man with the
strongest political pull, and In the end
the government pays pretty bill of
extras. But when 1t has a job on
hand involving difficult problems in
applied science, and calling for results
that will stand hard knocks and last
few centuries, it employs its own en-
gineers. The engineers build the light
houses that watch over those who go
down to the sea in ships; they erect
the Notifications that guard the great
ports they construct the locks at the
$500" and the reservoirs OH the upper
mississippi; and as nearly as may be
they keep within the appropriation.
For they expect to die poor, following
the advice of Andrew Carnegie.
So the engineers are at work above
Minnehaha. The first cofferdam was
begun in the sping Of 1899 under the
supervision of Maj. f. v. Abbot, of the
army engineers. His successor was