Building the Hoover Dam

Though it may not get the attention that, say, the pyramids of Egypt or the Empire State Building get, the Hoover Dam is one of the unheralded wonders of the modern world, a massive edifice of over 3.25 million cubic yards of concrete and 582 miles of cooling pipes that provides the West with 4.2 billion kilowatts of energy a year. The monetary cost was nearly 50 million in Depression-era dollars for a project of unprecedented size in the U.S., but the human cost was more dear -- at least 112 people died building the dam. July 7, 2010 marked the 79th anniversary of the start of the project, a huge chapter in the taming of the American West. And on Oct. 14, 2010, the biggest new addition to the dam -- a 2,000-foot-long, 900-foot-tall overpass bridge to alleviate the often dangerous traffic on the dam itself -- was dedicated.