This week in history

August 3, 1934, President Franklin Roosevelt visited the Grand Coulee Dam project. A massive project to ease joblessness during the Great Depression. Advocates for the construction of the dam lobbied for federal support for years.

Roosevelt’s predecessor, Herbert Hoover, an engineer, had rejected plans to construct the Grand Coulee Dam and the related Columbia Basin Irrigation project. Hoover said it was too expensive, and there would be no market for power produced by the dam. He also felt there was no need to bring new farmland into production, as there was an agricultural surplus.

Source: history.com

Compiled by Bob Valen