The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1913-07-28
.HARNEssINe wINooskl aver
To C'eveIop Between 5000 and 10000
Horse Power.

Horse Power.
Essex Junction, July 25-When the
Winooski Valley Power company
gets the dam erected at this place
there will be new lake, quarter
OF mile wide and two and half
miles in length, in Chittenden coun-
ty, and one of the largest power
plants in New England will be the
result. At present force of 250
men is engaged on the work. along
with about a dozen derricks, 10
steam engines, a private railroad
and many other pieces of apparatus
necessary to the accomplishment of
a large work by concern of the sizt
of the Share & Triest company,
is handling this contract. The work
will not be completed for more than
a year, just how long cannot be de-
termined. 1t depends upon too many
uncertainties, the nature of the rock
the weather, the water in the river
and more than all, upon the ice
which tears out dams all along the
rivers length in some springs
About mile and half below the
site another dam is being erected to
replace the wooden one at the gorge
and rs men are at work on this.
The Winooski Valley Power com
pany was organized for the purpose
of building this dam and is branch
OF the American Gas company. 1t is
therefore affiliated with the Burling
ton Light and Power company. When
nj hnt mn
horsepower will be developed and
the Juice" will be sold to any fac
tory within radius of so miles. AL
ready some OF the granite concerns
of Barre have contracted for power
and no concern is felt regarding the
utilizing of the power. Figures are
not obtainable, but it Is supposed the
cost of building the dam and power
house will be in the neighborhood o.
100000.
c. Il. Nightingale, engineer II
| charge, and the representative o
NJ. Kennedy of New York, who hal
charge of the Winooski Valley Pow
er company's interests, arrived a
Essex Junction more than year age
and with other took the preliminar,
| surveys. Ii was necessary to pur
| chase the entire Brownell farm ant
| water and flood rights OF at leas
| 10 more, before the project could b,
carried on, for the water in foot
| season will cover many a good sizet
| farm.
1t was not until two or three
| months ago that operations TOWARD
the actual construction were begun
| Then all kinds of machinery wer,
| rushed to the spot along with score,
| Of skilled workmen.
With the perfect organization OF
| machine operations were begun owe
| a stretch OF nearly a half mile ant
4 a great hole began to open up. On,
| gang does nothing but erect derrick
| and all of the work is detailed in thi
| manner. Some of the first thing
were the starting of two black
smith shops and saw mill VI
| above the dam, the commissary wal
| located and sleeping quarters for tn,
men provided. The men, by tn,
way. live well. the lowest salary Il
81 per day and from there 1t scars
| Native help is not obtainable, st
Spaniards, Greeks and Italians I'll
| most OF the places.
The rock at the site of the big dan
is OF. a firm limestone with som,
sandstone and is excellent for the
erection OF a dam. In the middle o.
the river is an island of some size
This will be removed and all of the
rock will be in the damitself. In
fact everything which is torn out OF
the ground will be put to some use
That is one of the tricks of the EN-
gineering. The sand is put into a
house 30 by Is feet in size at the
base and this feeds automatically in.
to a mixer which takes in the cor.
rect amount OF stone which the
crusher has prepared Hundreds of
tons OF material for the construction
OF Golfer dams. etc, can thus be
turned ont each day. and later on
the material for the big dam win
come from this and similar mixers.
Along the shore OF the river. at a
safe distance, are located the dyna