Shepherdstown register. [volume] (Shepherdstown, Va. [W. Va.]) 1849-1955, 1922-04-06

single foundation prepared at once.
So the engineers had to go ahead, ex-
cavate and make ready for the steel
girders on the site OF the Lisbon build
ing, and at the same time dig into the
earth under the Seaboard Bank, sup
porting it with snoring and underpin-
ming, while they set the great steel
and concrete foundations for the new
structure that was to cover the plot
Because OF the water this under
pinning had to be sunk fifty or sixty
feet until il rested on bed rock. The
utmost care had to be exercised with
the snoring lest it give way under
the strain Of tons standing on 60
foot stills stuck through mud and wa.
ter to bed rock. Coincident with all
this, the foundations had to be pre-.
pared for the other part Of the first
unit on the site Of the Lisbon build
inr.
Operations | and 2 were planned to
include basement some thirty seven
rect deep, where the boilers and var
ious huge pieces Of machinery, the
vitals OF the completed building, were
10 be situated. The combination OF
the water and the fact that the Sea-
board Bank could not move for some
months after the work was started
changed the aspect OF the lob from
piece of ordinarily interesting con-
struction to series Of operations that
have attracted the attention of the
entire building world.
When cellar is constructed through
earth and water, engineers use what
IS termed in the trade, a "pan." 1t
IS exactly like gigantic baking pan.
constructed OF steel and concrete, and
IS sunk, section by section, on the lines
OF the cellar. When it is finished. the
water is pumped out and the "pan"
remains, inclosing the so-called cellar
III water-tight walls. Usually this
pan" would have been sunk to bed
rock around the foundations of Opera.
tons and 2 and the water would
have been forgotten. But the neces-
sity of keeping business going on in
the Seaboard Bank prevented this.
Here is what was done. Through
the earth and water we're sunk tubes
OF steel down fifty or sixty feet TO
he'd rock. The earth was taken out
and the tube or shaft filled with CON-
crete. A number of these were sunk
on the site Of the Lisbon Building
More were sunk under the Seaboard
Bank while the persons doing tusi-
ness there were unaware that below
them, stretching a distance equal to
the height of the building, human
beings were driving into the bowels
OF the earth in their construction work
These steel stills, or legs, were to be
the foundations of Units and 2, pend
ing the construction of the foundation
wall behind the "pan."
Each of these shafts, as it sunk, is
big enough for at least two men to
work in comfortably. The men who
work in them-they are known in the
building trades as sand hogs"-enter
through an alright door to an air
chamber at the top of the tube. There,
by means of valves, the pressure is
regulated, and then another air-tieht
door is opened, admitting them TO the
lower part of the shaft, down which
they climb to the bottom.
II is their job with pick and shovel
to clear the way for the steel toes of
the shaft as, forced by tons and tons
OF concrete as a weight, it presses its
way slowly toward its destination
solid rock. Sometimes, in the course
of the work dynamite was employed.
Then the sand hog" went down and
set the charge, returning through the
alright doors, to await the looseninp
OF the hard material. And all the
tme care had to be exercised lest the
tube get off its course, setting too
much to the left or too much to the
right.
word about these sand hogs -
They deserve honorable mention wher-
ever they carry on in their dangerous
! 80. The air pressure at the foot of
, ,%ch tube as has been described
varies, being as high, sometimes, as
t1rty pounds. 1t has this peculiar
effect on man working under it, that
when he returns to the air after his
rtTiod below (under a State law he can