Gorsuch:
Today is November 24th, 1976
and I am talking to Mr. C. A. “Doc” Dambacher at his home on Peaceful Valley
Road, Sonora, California. My name is
Joan Cunningham Gorsuch.
Dambacher:
The picture I’m looking at now is Kennedy Lake which is famous in its
own right by virtue the fact that it was a famous fishing area way back during
the construction of the Relief Reservoir.
It naturally is a source of water that presently help supply the Tri Dam
Reservoir but beyond that we’ll say nothing more about the Kennedy
Reservoir. The next picture I’m looking
at is the road leading to Relief after crossing the river for the first
crossing. Now this picture doesn’t
necessary give complete justice to this type of construction because as you
look at the picture you do appreciate that this road has been chiseled out of
solid granite at a tremendous expense at that time because it was all hand
worked and blasted. That roadbed is just
sufficiently wide to accommodate a stage for these freight wagons. If a team had the misfortune of getting too
close to the edge, there was nothing to prevent it eventually winding up to the
river which is not seen in this particular picture. This was quite an engineering feed and one of
the real problems of getting freight to Relief.
The next picture I’m looking at is the Relief Meadow looking upstream
from the dam site. This, of course, is
all underwater at this time. The next
picture is just the general area around the Relief Reservoir looking west to
the chimney peaks on which from this point would be east of the Eagle
Meadows. The next picture is the Relief
campsite with the warehouses and some of the residents’ just it would…these buildings we see in the hallow
would be just of the south end, east of the dam construction which is
not in this picture. The smaller
buildings in the foreground, just below the two ladies, one is a barn and the
other is a structure which is at a very short distance from the number two
donkey hoist that helped the teams with the freight up a road so steep that the
animals, in their own right, could not haul the freight so the operation placed
two donkeys; one at this particular site and one down road closer to the river,
and they would hook on to these teams with a big cable and the steam donkey
would take most of load and the teams got so familiar with what took place they
seemed to just relax and keep loose tugs while this donkey engine did the
rest. Of course the teams had to more or
less guide the wagons up the road under this circumstance, and there’s a very
long story in connection to that that I’ll pass on to the next. This picture is the so-called “chimneys” that
I referred to a minute ago only had been enlarged since and they are in view
from many points as you go up Highway 108 and in this picture as you look at it
you, the observer, is looking west and the chimneys are the between the East
Valley and Eagle Meadows to appear in that era.
*unintelligible* (5:44-5:48)
Dambacher:
This next picture shows the dam under construction with the scaffolding
along the base of the dam which in some sense has made the Mason rig work that
we see in this picture possible. On this
dam is a rock filled dam which means the main support of the structure is a
rock fill with a mason reface and this mason reface is a considerable thickness
and is all martyred in for the sealing agent for
the dam (___). Now earth filled dams are of a
similar construction but back then and in this area it was impossible to borrow
enough soil to make an earth filled dam, so this is a rock filled dam with a
mason reface. Now they used large stones
in this mason reconstruction are work quarry out
of the dam site as you could appreciate as you looked at it in this picture. The material was transported from the quarry
sites first picked up by large (___) and placed
where overhead skips…picked them up and these skips ran across over, the river,
above the dam on big gable highline that in turn
made it possible to place the fill and these rocks in the particular position
desired. I’ll go to the next picture and
comment on. In this picture we see the
two so-called “highlines”
and on one of the highlines this (___) in this is suspended and in my opinion it is
being transported from the east bank of the
river to the west bank (___) usage on that side
but the only way you could cross the river in this particular area was either
by launch on the dam water or the highline and there would be no occasion to
have a wagon on the west bank other than from some usage in messing with the
construction of the road, but this is quite a picture because it gives you an
idea of the heighth of this highline because heighth is very readily discerned
by the comparison of the size of the men in that wagon and in comparison of the heighth of the
structure and the (___) is one of the large
barrack’s used in moving these stones and doing other work in connection with
the dam construction. This is a dandy
picture because it tells a lot of story.
The
next picture we’re looking at is the dam; again, under construction showing
scaffolding as well as some of the masonry to read
Derek’s and in the bottom is the penstock the large pipe that took the
water down the river and to be discharged again for transportation down the
river. In this picture we did a good idea
of where the rock was quarried so part of the construction in the reservoir
site, but most of the rock in the fill of this dam came from the opposite side
of what we’re looking at here. In the
back behind the dam were enormous, big quarries that supplied the fill rock
that used the dam proper and supports it the way that it is in Sugar Pine in
bottle water that’s in there. Now this
dam is arched downstream and not upstream as you would assume, and there was a
very good and sufficient reason for that that I, at this point, won’t attempt
to tell. In the two years after the
construction, a crack developed in the face of the dam in the masonry work and
that was repaired with some concern, but I’ve been told by very capable
engineers that that dam is solid in the never-ending fear of it ever going out
but a lot of people could tell you the curvature downstream rather than
upstream to get the benefit of compression that concerns some people that
they’ve had a reason for that decision to (___) (___).
The
next picture we’re looking at gives one the advantage of seeing the highline
from another point of view and the building houses the engine that operated
these large skips that you see in connection of
the overhead highline. I’m about to make
a statement that I think I won’t because I could be challenged on to say that
these little smoosh boxes would work for but I’m going to refrain from
that.
The
next picture shows one of the large barracks picking up a very large boulder
for placement in this dam and when one appreciates the size of the men in
comparison to the boulder and the derrick proper, you appreciate how massive
these laminated derricks were. Those
derricks are all wooden structure and steel.
The
next picture is, again, one of the derricks in the background, several workmen
apparently in preparation of time on the (___) boulder
in the foreground gives one a better appreciation of the size of these boulders
lifted by these derricks first and then later picked up by the highline between
the men in the foreground and the derrick in the background, you can see a
jackhammer in operation starting to quarry out the face of the granite which
was done in many different areas to secure the rock or the dam itself. Now that’s the pictures.
Gorsuch:
And you said that you didn’t actually work on the construction?
Dambacher:
No I was too young, but because of the family relationship my sisters end up there, I was invited as a guest of the Poacher family to spend some time at Relief. And I had the pleasure as a youngster going
up there and observing what I just told you.
I was very, very interested in those kind of things and had the personal
impression that my gosh if they’d give me a job, I
could do as all as any of those men out there.
And I remember one time they were hauling the wood out of the valley
at…to the dam site to as fuel for the boulders and these boilers for the donkey
engine and it was being hauled in four foot lattice hardwood
and they had several men transporting it from the wagon that hauled it in to
each of these donkey sites to stack it for fuel and all these men would do is
to take one piece of this hardwood from the wagon and carry it upon their
shoulder and their arms to the (___) site and as
a kid thinking this was a really dry wood, I felt those men should’ve taken two
pieces and not one, so I said to Mr. Poacher, “Now I can do better than those
fellows. I could carry two sticks of
that wood instead of one like they’re doing it.” And he said to me, “Well now young man if you
think you can do that, I’ll just give you a job.” Well as the point was that wood was closer to
being green than dry and it was as heavy as lead. Those fellows had just about all they could
do. That’s as close as I ever got to
working at Relief. Another thing that
took me to Relief was great interest. My
older brother drove one of the freight curines at haul a
great deal of the freight to Relief during its construction. Now we have to visualize that that…this
freight was all hauled by Jean’s freight wagons
in that there was no other means of transportation and the elevation that they
had to converse from Middle Camp where the freight teams picked up the freight.
Gorsuch:
Where was that located?
Dambacher:
Middle Camp is just west and south of Sugar Pine. There’s a branch road that takes off at Sugar
Pine in a wester…south western direction and Middle Camp is down on the railroad…the
Sugar Pine Railroad site. The Standard
Lumbar Company had a…well an operation at Sugar Pine…I mean at Middle Camp at
this time where they piled some lumbar and had a freight ship to accommodate
some of this freight that was going into Relief, and it was cheaper to put it
on the, then, Sugar Pine Railroad than its wherever dominated in the Bay Area
depending on what the articles were and then they loaded it on the freight
teams at this place called Middle Camp and then from there hauled into the
mountains. Now Middle Camp was an
operation of the Standard Lumbar Company and of course you could go into the (___) detail on that but maybe not in proper content
that you’re here about. But these teams
had to haul to various stations, so the first day’s trek was from Middle Camp
to Strawberry. There was an overnight
stay there for those teams and it would take all day by team to get from Middle
Camp to Strawberry. The next day’s trek
was from Strawberry to Niagara Creek.
Niagara Creek was just ahead of the Patterson Grade. In those days, Patterson Grade was something
that everybody talked about because it was steep and winding and dangerous to
traverse and these freight teams had to haul this…every load those very
vicarious roads and it took a real expert in the handling of those long-lined
teams to negotiate that road. Well today
all that road is realigned where the average driver
has no appreciation as what is was back when Relief was under
construction. So then they…the next day
after an overnight stay at Niagara, they then went from there to Relief and
that was a very hard day’s haul because after you got down the Patterson Grade
and across Kennedy Meadows, it was quite the love of those horses to get that
freight to its destination of Relief.
Now there’s many stories in this situation that
would be very interesting, but they are aside from what you’re here about. I won’t go into at this point. Transporting that…all that
cement which made the concrete that had to do all the steel that went
into the reinforcing, all that machinery, all the supplies for the commissary and
for the (___) and mess hall might (___). It all
had to be freighted in and we’re thinking in terms of the hauling all the
groceries and the fresh vegetables that they end up carrying and it was
enormous undertaking. Today this job
would be considered “a simple” but in that time it was a real sizeable
undertaking.
Gorsuch:
Do you have any idea how many people were employed in any one time
there?
Dambacher:
Yeah I would say up to 300 men at a time. Now that varied; some years
less, some years more and in all fairness to anyone that had a part in this
construction, I’m going to make a comment on behalf of Mr. Poacher. Until he
took over, they claimed that they had three crews on the Relief construction;
one coming and one going and one on the job and it (___)
failed because of that. They…the
cost was prohibited and they, at one time, were going
to abandon this project on the basis that they couldn’t cope with it. They couldn’t keep men there and the story
comes to me that one of the directors said, “Why don’t we give young Poacher a
place at this before we abandon the project?”
This man, Ray Poacher, had the reputation of being a son of an engineer
that knew his business well as an engineer and a construction man, but he was
also a diplomat; a man that could handle people and that’s why he was selected
to go there and it didn’t take him too long the real problem that was about (___) (___) (___).
He…I went with him at one time over the job which I was most grateful
for the opportunity and I was in embarrassed for him when I saw what took
place. They naturally had the men of all
nationalities working there and different stations in life and I saw them in
just tip their hat and bow when he went by and then he turned to me and showed
his embarrassment but it was the worship that he build up with those men that
was on that job. They would’ve died for
him. Now he was a man capable to the
point that there wasn’t a job among that entire construction that he couldn’t
do and actually did do. On this same little trip that I’m talking about, he
would go over to one of these big derricks and say to the engineer on it or the
operator as we name it “Termit.” “Joe don’t you think you ought to take a
blow? I’ll take those.” And he had run
that for a long enough time to give that fellow a break and then he called him
back and relieved him and they go down to maybe some of the masons and say,
“Pete take a blow and I’ll take over here a minute.” And he set some rocks.
Gorsuch:
I’ll bet they didn’t have coffee breaks in those days?
Dambacher:
No coffee breaks and the break they got was this man superintendent Ray
Poacher going around to each of these operations and relieving those men and of
course he built confidence. What he was
doing was two or three things; showing every one of them that he could do their
job as well as they did and at the same time he didn’t feel he was above it and
that’s how the organizers ignite this operation. At night, he would hold a meeting with his
foreman, which (___) (___), down at the
commissary and they’d all sit out there in a circle and he would discuss with
these men’s of the pros and cons of the day, telling what he wanted them to do
the next day and call to their attention something he thought was different and
did it in just such a manner that he was one of them. As I say, they actually worshiped him. He was
that kind of a man and he made the construction of the Relief possible.
Gorsuch:
When did the construction start?
Dambacher:
I would say…we…I of course in the preliminary work that had gone back
many years before the preliminary engineering and design and all that, but I
think the actual construction was possibly six, seven, eight in there and I think Poacher took over in eight, nine…
Gorsuch:
1908.
Dambacher:
1908 and of course the dam was under construction before that, so I
would say ’06 or ’07 and completed in about ’12…1912 (___)
(___). But it’s difficult for
people today to fully appreciate what an undertaking that was way back when and
the talking horse and buggies and the hand
handling of all that equipment as against what we have today to do that type of
work.
Gorsuch:
*can’t hear* (26:58-27:03)
Dambacher:
I think it would’ve been ’10 or ’11.
Gorsuch:
About ’10 or ’11?
Dambacher:
Yeah.
Gorsuch:
Before going, pictures referred to (___) (___) east
of (___) California, the photographer was G.R.
Gross *flaw in tape* (27:20) in the Tuolumne
County California pictorial *flaw in tape* (27:24) book
by the Union Democrat on page 107 is described “as a commercial photographer
that he’d done very fine work with the camera.
Some of his views depicted wild (___) scenery
and seems that the mills, lines, or construction camp of the county are
faithfully reproducing his value *flaw in tape*
(27:44-27-45) views in constant demand in all portions of the county
showing urban, sub-urban, inter-urban …
END TAPE
General Information:
Interviewer: Joan Cunningham Gorsuch
Interviewee: Charles Arthur Dambacher
Name of Tape: C.A. "Doc"
Dambacher describes Relief Dam Photos
When: November 24, 1976
Transcriber: Dee-Ann Horn
Transcribed: 2/24/2018