The Kennewick courier-reporter. [volume] (Kennewick, Wash.) 1914-1938, 1922-09-28
|,>'.seood With Plans For
Priest Rapids Project

CATION locks which it will contain,
ETC., representing cost of $40
900. 1t is conservatively stated that
fully $6,0O0,OOO has already been
expended in the preliminary engin-
ering work at Priest Rapids, and
the acquiring of flood lands and
other necessary rights.
The tract of 100000 acres of
land involved is greater than the
broad valley surrounding the town
of Yakima. Yakima County's rich
lands have given it as high as
second place among all the counties
in the United States. Yakima
products have reached up to S45,-
100000 in a single year. This
helps to visualize the immensely of
this one phase of the Priest Rapids
development-the irrigation feat
ure.
Students of the railway situation
as affecting Seattle and the Pacific
Northwest see unusual sjgnific-
ance in the application of the
Wenatchee Southern Railway for
permission from the Public Service
Commission to build a line of 129
miles south from Wenatchee along
the west bank of the Columbia
River to Kennewick, connecting the
Chicago, Milwaukee & st. Paul, the
Northern Pacific, the Great North
ern, the Union Pacific and the
Spokane, Portland & Seattle.
This line, estimated to cost, 3d.
100000 will serve as an outlet
north and south from Priest Rap
ids, give the district four trans
continental railways and will also
serve as additional facilities for
the new line of the Union Pacific
in reaching toward Puget Sound.
1t was recently revealed that the
Union Pacific was planning to
build from Pendleton, Ore, to Wal
la Walla, Washington, giving it
with it's connections, direct route
to Puget Sound.
This direct entry of the Union
Pacific into the Northwest is re-
garded as ore of the most import
ant strategic moves on the part of
the railways serving the Upper
Pacific Coast in the last decade.
These statements emphasize the
nature of the industrial develop
ment following the building of the
power plant. Priest Rapids will
be quarter of a century later
than Niagara and will represent
the highest electrical development
of the age. The war advanced in
dustrial chemistry and metallurgy
far beyond the ordinary knowledge
of the public and here at Priest
Rapids, where power will be pro-
duced more economically than any
where else In the United States,
these new processes will be called
into action by the General Electric
organization and its associates in
a way which promises to make
Priest Rapids one of the industrial
centers of America.
1t is known to be in connection
with these industrial developments
that Mr.. Pierce is now in Europe.
In these new developments and IN
the general advance of knowledge
along these lines is known TO be
the solution of the problem of util-
izing such an immense flow of
power as will be generated by the
Columbia River at Priest Rapids.
AS an illustration of these de-
velopments in metallurgy reference
may be made to the changes taking
place in the last few years in the
treatment and handling of zinc
ores. Until low price electrical
power was applied to the reduction
in zinc ores the old retort processes
required ores running above 35 per
cent to produce zine economically.
And then there were three grades
of zinc as complication. Now
by electrical processes zinc ore of
the very lowest grade can be hand
led economically and effectively
and all the zinc produced is of
the highest quality.
1t is significant that large bodies
of zinc and other metal ores are
known to exist in the Cascades and
in the northeastern part of Wash
ington and Northern Idaho. All
these will be tributary to Priest
Rapids.