The lady has lost her charm

Grand Coulee Dam isn’t what it used to be.

I first saw Grand Coulee Dam in 1948. The dam was just 6 years old. Construction started in 1933 and was completed in 1942.

Several seniors along with me had taken a couple days off from school with the excuse that we were going to Spokane to visit the “Freedom Train” that was touring the country. It contained, for everyone to see, several of the country’s original documents.

We had arranged to be away so we could visit the train with the understanding that we would write a report about it. We had no intention of visiting the train and knew we could read reports from the Spokesman Review for information for our report.

We did go to Spokane, only long enough to turn west. That’s when I saw the dam for the first time.

I remember the noise from the water going over and how cool it was in the area below the dam. We didn’t linger long but were impressed how neat everything was. Little did I know that in just a few years I would move to the area. I married in the meantime and moved here in 1953.

Just recently it was rewarding to see the spill over the dam. It made you notice the dam as you drove up or down the Coulee Dam hill.

Recent spills are neat, but hardly a trickle compared to the flow of water back in the 1950s. Water several feet deep spilled until the completion of the Third Powerhouse in 1974.

No wonder that Grand Coulee Dam was thought of as the eighth wonder of the world at the time.

We used to drive around and see how many states were represented by the cars in the area. People actually drove from all over to see the miracle of Grand Coulee Dam. You were welcome to drive across the top of the dam, get out and overlook the spillway.

If you were lucky enough to have a few bucks, you could stop by the Green Hut for a lovely meal with white tablecloths and all.

At the time, I was grading lumber at the small mill just above the dam. I recall that summers were hotter then. For the evening meal, our family would pack a lunch and take it to Douglas Park and enjoy the cool area below the dam. Douglas Park at the time was beautiful. The roar of the water spilling was constant, and some people complained that it kept them awake until they got used to it.

The surroundings of the federal project were neat and clean, even beautiful.

Tours were better then. I knew one operator, John Gigous, now deceased, who took me on a personal tour to bedrock at the lowest reaches of the dam. Projects age, and sometimes circumstances change things.

But the old girl is not what it used to be.

We still get a handful of tourists who look up at the grey concrete structure and ask is that all there is.

Surroundings are not cared for the same, tours are not as interesting, and you can’t drive over the dam anymore.

Of course you have 9/11, budgets and a lesser level of pride than you had when the dam was new, or newer.

So when spring runoffs allow officials to spill water, you get just a touch of what it was like years ago. When water spills you notice the dam immediately.