The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-04-19
The Splendid Power
 House Near Tallassee
By Will T. Sheehan

the idea to its fruition.
 IThe place in the river wisely chosen for the dam is perhaps three miles from the town of Tallassee. The dam, tar above the dam at the brink of the Tal- lassee Falls cannot be seen from the mill or from the town of Tallassee. A winding country road, up and down rocky hills, leads from Tallassee to the dam, locally called the Upper Works" The last stage of the road Is through a pine wood on a rocky hillside.
 And here on this half a mile of made road one gets his first impression of the stupendous nature of the undertaking. Running along the convolutions or this hill the road was cut down and built up until it is as fine piece of road as is in the whole of Elmore County. This had to' be done, however. Pieces of machinery that went into the power house weighed thousands of pounds. Tons of valuable freight were hauled over this specially made road with spe- cially built wagons. The mere haul ing of each of these big fly wheels from Tallassee to the dam was in it. self an industrial problem of no small importance.
 An Immense Undertaking.
 It was a big undertaking, the con- struction of this dam. Its leap from bank to bank of the Tallapoosa River is $50 feet long. The spillway of the dam, that point over which the water of the Tallapoosa pours, Is 600 feet long, or as wide as the river at some of It's broadest points. The dam itself is forty-one feet high and 1t is forty-on feet broad. At the top where the water pours over it is ten feet broad.
 The dam is built of blue granite blasted from the bed of the river. The stones are held together with concrete so that the entire structure is to all intents and purposes one piece of solid rock.
 I asked Superintendent Noble how deep were the foundations. We have never been able to tell" was his an- swer "The bed of the river Is bed of rock How deep that bed of rock $ we can only estimate. In building the dam 1t was made certain that all cracked or imperfect rock were re- moved and that the foundations should be placed upon nothing less solid than perfect rock"
 Equally firm is the joint of the dam on either side. At either end the dam loses itself in rock walls.
 The structure is in a way, in the form of a pyramid. For miles up the river this restraining pyramid holds the waters of the Tallapoosa still and smooth. The waters are some two or three feet above the spillway and they slip over the stone dam like the un- winding of a huge piece of ribbon 600 feet broad. Half way down to the seething whirlpools behind the fall of the water Is broken by the pyramid shape of the dam and the tons of wa ter slip into the pools and rapids in huge white sheets, while light cloudy mists rise and circle above.
 The power house nestles close to the rocky bank on the Elmore County side of the river. Behind the dam and close l to the brink of the river place was blasted out and the structure was built of the blue granite rocks. The roof of the two storied structure is only few feet above the top of the dam. One leaves the earth and enters the power house by Stepping over a bridge to a little verandah, from which q door leads. Within the door the de- scent Is made to the ground floor on which Is set the huge machinery for , making and transmitting electricity. In the corner a small barrel stove is sitting. It Is there to give warmth to the switchmen and others about the plant. This Is the only thing about the plant in which any fire is built or any fuel of any sort is used. It was odd, to say the least, to one unaccus- toned to the sight to see huge pieces of machinery with a world of power in their flying wheels and to know that there Is naught of coal, coke, fire or steam about the whole place.
 Making Electricity.
 A friend from Tallassee, who accom- panied me. pulled off his watch as we entered the power room and laid 1t on a glass insulator.
 These machines" he said, will ruin your watch. They are so heavily mag netized that the best works in. any watch would be ruined if they were brought in the neighborhood of these big wheels"
 There are three of these big wheels doing business on the concrete floor of the power house. Each wheel has its governor" an intricate piece of machinery with the whirring balls, the brass fingers and the long arm reach- ing to the turbines. Next to the big wheel the most prominent objects In the room was a tall switchboard look ing like a cross between a telephone board, and the front end of locomo- tive engineers cab. It is fitted up with half a score of things like a steam gauge on which were measured "amperes," 'kIlowatts," "warts' and other mysterious matters.
 How is electricity made anI how is it sent to Montgomery?
 That was the question I wanted an- swered so that I might recori and set down the answer. I got technical definition of the manufacture of elec- tricity, but I only partially understood It. [ was relieved when Supcrimten- dent Noble said:
 "No man can understand electricity unless he studies 1t and no man can understand alternating currents no matter how much he studies It unless he has a good education.'
 I could and did understand III general way the manufacture and transmission of this power.
 The water comes into the power house from the dam above in big tubes twelve feet in diameter There are four of these tubes, but only three of them are now in use. one for each generator. The fourth stands ready for service when an additional genera tor is put m.
 Within each of the tubes are the two turbine wheels. one revolving to the right and one to the left. These whirl- ing wheels turn the heavy shaft. which in turn revolves at lightning 3pa sd the a word or two about one of these three generators. all of which are alike.
 The generator may he compared to a huge buggy wheel of which the tire and felloe is fixed, while the spokes within the circle revolve rapidly all most touching the rim. In these big generators the usual method of mak- ing electricity is somewhat reversed. With them the field revolves while the armature remains stationary. The field is reuresented by the spokes of the