Pioneering in Electricity, 1935

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From The Reclamation Era, Vol. 25, by Anne H. T. Donaldson, 1935.

Pioneering in Electricity

Less than 6 months ago the site of the world's first all-electric town, Mason City, Wash., was a desert waste of sagebrush and sand. To a New York tender-foot, viewing for the first time last August the location of her future hometown (soon to be built by the Mason-Walsh- Atkinson-Kier Co. for the construction of the Grand Coulee Dam), the prospect was not inspiring. To be sure, after the monotonous hundred-mile drive from Spokane across the brown and yellow parched plains, the sudden drop into the magnificent gorge of the Columbia River was a thrilling experience. We seemed to have reached without warning the rim of another world. We looked down a thousand feet and several miles across one of the wildest and finest stretches of the glorious "River of the West."

Dark and towering granite walls form one side of the basin. Through these walls a jagged chasm indicates that here the Columbia once, ages ago the geologists say, cut herself a new course for an unknown period of time, forming that spectacular river bed with its Dry Falls, known as the Grand Coulee. Within our present view the stream, swift and imposing, makes two wide bends, coming out of the East and turning due North, and at the far end of the gorge disappearing westward. Undisturbed by man through the ages, ranges of high bare hills of every shape and shade surround these grand sweeps of the river, forming a scene of wild beauty.

But already the site of the future dam was shown by earthworks just below the first bend. The Government engineers had been making preliminary excavations, and everywhere could be seen disfiguring but eloquent signs of the arrival of desperate job hunters. Hideous shanties and houses on wheels were grouped into little settlements here and there, where, according to the optimistic real-estate notices, all-electric cities would soon develop.

The particular spot pointed out as the future Mason City seemed the most remote and desolate in the whole wild landscape, a high plateau 250 feet above the river, so perpendicular that the road to the top was cut zigzag along the cliff, and the river itself can only be seen from the edge of the plain. We ferried across in a small but jaunty boat, which was suddenly snatched by the swift current in midstream and whirled around alarmingly, but miraculously managed to edge itself back to the landing.

We climbed the bank through sand a foot deep and there surveyed our future home. Not a tree or shrub in sight on the whole extent of the plateau, not a sign of life except one immense jack rabbit that resented my attempt to share with him the doubtful shelter of a sagebush, and leaped straight toward me and then away. As the first woman visitor, I was offered the privilege of turning the first soil of the future city, but the heat of midday, 110°, and the prospect generally did not combine to make me appreciate the honor. I should be proud today to say that I had accepted it.

As I write, the 1st of March, we are a full-grown town of 2,500 inhabitants. There are more than 280 bungalows, 2-, 3-, 4-, and 5-room houses, all with baths and excellent modern plumbing, with garages and leveled lawn space. There are 10 blocks of bunkhouses for men, comfortably furnished, and an attractive dormitory with dining hall for women. There is a huge mess hall, where 1,000 persons are fed three meals a day, and a good hotel of 40 rooms that cannot begin to take care of the daily visitors.

There is a well-equipped hospital of 37 beds, a large general store, where every kind of household necessity, excellent food and clothing, and many luxuries may be purchased at the prevailing prices of the region. There is a post office, a branch of one of the Spokane banks, a model laundry, a fine garage and service station. There is a large recreation hall with billiard and pool rooms and a well-managed lunchroom, a theater which seats 450 people and has good moving pictures every afternoon and evening; all this in addition to the splendid administration building and other offices, the carpenter and paint shops, the vast machine shops and boiler works—all the elaborate and most up-to-date plant required for the actual construction of the largest dam in the world, and all working just now full speed ahead in order to finish the gigantic west coffer-dam before high water.

Feminine Misgivings—Allayed

During the autumn months the question of interest to the women, who were waiting in Spokane to join their husbands at Mason City, was just what was to be our part in such an absorbingly masculine undertaking in so remote a section of the country. There were predictions of a long, cold winter. How did we expect to keep warm in the 20-below-zero weather that was expected? All this talk about electric heating! Who knew that it would work?

Only Juan Hargrove, the architect responsible for the electric heating, cheered us by his assurance. The houses we saw being built in sections in Spokane and carried out on trucks were to be assembled without chimneys or cellars, without plaster or insulation, stuck up on concrete blocks and banked with earth. No hope of other heating than electricity! Would there ever be enough power available for all the needs of a town in zero weather? My own heart failed when my husband pointed out the three slender wires bringing, from 30 miles away over the mountains and in one long span across the river, the wonderful "juice" that was to work the miracle!

It was the last of November before there was enough current for domestic use, and the first houses to be ready—the little three-room cottages were in great demand. I drove out through the first blinding blizzard of the winter, the last 20 miles entirely in second gear, unable to see beyond the hood of the car or steer straight on the icy road. Arriving cold and hungry, I found that everybody had forgotten to "connect up" the just completed house assigned to me, which I had planned to get in order as a surprise for my husband who had gone East on a business trip.

The three rooms were piled to the ceiling with crated furniture from the second-hand stores of Spokane. It was icy cold and damp; there was no kitchen range, heat, or water. In less than an hour all these important details had been supplied by a simple process of "hooking up", the house was marvelously warm and dry, dinner was cooking on the excellent electric range—rented from the company at $2.50 a month—and I had become one of the most enthusiastic converts to electric heating. We spent December and January in this small workman's cottage, and except for space—there were three of us—we could not have been more comfortable anywhere.

At the end of January, during the coldest week of the winter, we moved into our five-room bungalow on the exposed hilltop overlooking the town, and from our well-heated living room incredulously watched the thermometer on the front porch descend to 12 below zero. In these larger houses we are trying out different kinds of insulating materials between the siding and insulation board, and are finding that these greatly reduce the amount of electricity required.

The heating units in general use are of different sizes and power according to the size of the rooms. They "plug in" and turn on and off as simply as electric lamps. They are equipped with fans which keep the heated air circulating and the whole room an even temperature. They heat the house very rapidly and are now being built with thermostats so that they will operate automatically at a given temperature. They require no special care and have safety devices, making it possible to leave them turned on in a closed or empty house. It is expected that the fan device will keep the houses comfortable during the hot summer months.

Because of the low rate for current charged us by the MWAK Co., we women have become electrically minded, and use freely all the wonderful appliances on the market — water heaters (furnished in all the houses), refrigerators, washing machines, vacuum cleaners, coffee percolators, waffle irons, and toasters. All the more difficult problems of housekeeping are thus solved for us. Camp life in the wilds offers us none of the usual hardships. We have time and leisure to appreciate and enjoy our privilege in watching the miracle of the slender wires under man's competent control and management transform, almost between two seasons, a wilderness into a complete and attractive city. We have strength left over from our daily tasks to help with the big achievement, to interest ourselves in the school with its fine new building soon to be started, in organizing the several churches to be built shortly, to visit the sick in the hospital, the recreation hall, the movies and the library.

Yes, we really have time for books and study. Some of us are poring over garden catalogs and botanies, preparing ourselves for gardening intelligently in unfamiliar soil and climate, and for familiarity with the particularly beautiful wild flowers of the region. For, already, spring is throwing her veil of tender green over the bare hills and shadowy canyons, and we are joyfully discovering why our Indian neighbors in the valley call this blustery month of March, "the Month of Blossoming Buttercups."

If, as we hope, our Government will be able, by harnessing these great waterways of our country, to develop electric power to the point of practical everyday use by all the people, as we are using it here, there will be a new era of emancipation, a veritable New Deal for women. The machine age will not have deprived us of our jobs, but releasing them from drudgery will set our spirits free for greater and more inspiring accomplishment. We women of Mason City will then be proud indeed to have had our small share in the building of the Grand Coulee Dam, which is to pioneer in electricity.

Donaldson, Anne. “Pioneering in Electricity.” The Reclamation Era. Vol 25. United States Department of the Interior. 1935.

Anne Donaldson

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