Unemployment. A National Program and the Tennessee Valley is a 1936 film created by the tva to promote their efforts and show the construction of two massive products, the noris dam and wheeler dam in alabama. And are still operational on the historical register of historical places. [horns playing] which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] two rivers joined to make the tennessee. Heres where they meet, just above knoxville, tennessee. To this point it is 622 miles where the tennessee flows into the ohio. A number of major tributaries over 400 miles of the water basin. Theres rainfall ranging between 50 and 80 inches a year. These rivers and a myriad of smaller streams pass a richly diversified area. The Tennessee Valley is a fair crosssection of our country. Thanhers are more acute elsewhere. In the maze, the problems of the valley are the problems of america. Here comes the outline of the Tennessee Valley. The area in which president roosevelt asked congress to establish a demonstration of national planning. Let us examine some of the conditions the president is determined to correct. Thisurse, such property as is not universal in the valley, but it exists and all to frequently. Tennesseen the tin valley but through the length and breath of our land. Is regimentation with a vengeance. The regimentation of poverty. Sometimes the outlook is so hopeless that men actually abandoned their farms. Here is where one did. Principal reason for abandoning farms is soil erosion. Torrential rain, washes away the soil and destroys the growing power of the land. Floods have taken their toll in human misery, destroying millions of dollars in property every year. Are some of the reasons why president roosevelt asked to create the Tennessee Valley authority. He had in mind the tremendous National Investment lying idle. Plants built as wartime emergency measures. Powerhouse begun during the world war. He believes that these objectives when realize will not only bring about the economic and social wellbeing of the People Living in the valley, but also points away for similar advances throughout the rest of the country. Actual construction operations start. These come artmans close a portion of the river. When they are pumped dry, they begin excavating. Excavation is complete and the placing of concrete has begun. Rising 206 the five feet and 210 feet thick at the base. What you see on the left, the dolamite stone, suited for making concrete. Show you from start to finish the straightline operation which turned into highgrade concrete. A compression of air 175 pounds per square inch. They prepare the exposed rock for blasting. Ready, thehing is signal is given and there she goes. One goes over the edge, no, not quite. Here comes another. Shovels move in as soon as the smoke is clear. There. That did it. A relief to get that one down. With this all important dolomite rock, these trucks leave the scene of the blast and wind there down the quarry where the truck dumps its load below. The shape and size of rock mean nothing. Its job is to reduce everything. It does this with a slight spindle in the center there. This crusher is embedded in the hillside and drops the crush deliveronveyor belt to its load to the secondary one standing in between the two conveyor belts. The conveyor in the background comes from the primary crusher on the hillside. Here, the stone is reduced to various sizes, three inches and under, and poured into the lower belt. It is sorted into four sizes and passing over the screens. Concrete screen is a with electrically operated gates and conveyor to carry any desired size forward. Too fine is taken over to the belt to be made into sand. Intohave been screened sizes and free of all impurities. Finally, the sand is carried out on the belt to the left and dumped into storage files. Meanwhile, cement is taken from this storage tank at the railroad five miles away and carried to a similar one at the dam. A heavyduty concrete highway built by the tv to transport materials and equipment. It goes through beautiful wooded hills, a silhouette of the distance. When that is complete, it will form a permanent path of tennessees highway system. All these operations come stander, beneath which three concrete mixers with stone, sand and cement to turn into concrete. Scales with dials register the weight. An operator proportions the ingredients. No, not quite enough that time. Better give it a little more. Theerre, thats right. The batch shoots down through this funnel to charge one of the three mixers. This plant is electrically timed to deliver three cubic yards of fresh concrete every minute. When the mixture is ready, it is poured into gasoline driven transfer cars which carry the concrete over the shoulder of the hill. These buckets hold six cubic yards and there are two of them in operation. One of them receives that load every minute and a half, day and night. It will take one million cubic yards to complete the dam. 166,000 bucketfuls must be swung out and deposited. This bucket now swinging through the air has historic significance, for it contains the fresh concrete to be deposited at norris dam in july 1934. The two cables used are suspended between the tower high to the west and the tower 925 feet away across the site. The carriage runs on each cable, both of which hangs with a massive up to lift the concrete bucket or any other heavy object the engineers wish to have moved. Towerrator in each controls the full operation of his cable. It is a simple matter for him to raise and lower the hook, to run the carriage up and back. Stream at will. The main cable is anchored securely at each end. Trends of5 separate steel wire which gives the cable the breaking strength of 1,100 ,000 pounds. When Franklin D Roosevelt visited norris dam, he was operated i interested in the opn of the cable weight. After inspection, she went into detail with the Tennessee Valley authority. Who with his fellow directors guide the activities of the authority. She carried herself fortunate in being given a ride, hooked onto the giveaway in place of a concrete bucket. A delicate operation was the placing of 20 foot steel tubes to cap the water through the dam into the turbans. Here they are attaching both cables to the first section. Tos tells the Cable Operators take it away. Weigh 40 tons a piece and keeping the two cables and step is the perfect coordination. Its clear off the ground now. Its on its way. In toere it is settling its cradle at the base of the dam. When all sections of both have been laid, concrete will rise around them. Now this shift which is worth five and a half hours is through for the day and waiting on a new shift. Soon, the men you see on the ground will be rolling towards the town which serves them as a construction camp. Recreation plays an important part in the lives of norris dam workers. The Community House contains a reading room, a library, as well as motion pictures, basketball and a variety of indoor games. Then, the post office and chapel where ministers of various denominations hold services. And a community bank. These dormitories are also a permanent part of the town. Heres where the girls around the cafeteria live. This cafeteria serves 3300 wellbalanced meals a day. Lets go inside. Outdoor work brings these chaps feeling good and hungry. The helpings are generous. Look at the milk bottles. Visitors often comment on the high type of worker employed there. 350 individual houses have been built at norris. Some are brick, some are wood. One of steel. Several are stone and a large number are cinderblocks. While providing houses for married workers, the authority is giving contributions to the housing problems of america. Of cinderblocks and Home Construction has opened low cost housing. Ordinary is mixed with cement and cast into large blocks, easily laid. Due to the low building cost, it is possible for a man to rent a modern well insulated home for 14. 50 a month. Imagine if you had only this about to spend on rent. Could you get a house in your town like this . The authority maintains trade shops for maintenance and retain work. They also train schools where Vocational Training are offered to workers in their spare time. Trade unions which anyone is free to join are backing the training to collaborate. In some cases, even initiating new ones. Have signed ups for one or more courses. The men are acquiring new skills which will give them the netted source of income when they return to their home. Courses in ceramics, mathematics, dairy, and other subjects. Here are the citizens of norris, arranged on a shady hillside. They watch some of their fellows competing in a holiday sports. Norris knows what all work and no play does to jack. To jill too for that matter. Wheeler,lant such as power is generated in proportion with the water flowing. When the river is high, much power can be developed. When it is low, little is developed. During the dry period, the water stored in the reservoir will be released, generating power again and again as it passes each river plant such as wheeler. That dam get down into and watch them pave the way for a blast which will loosen tons and tons of rock from the riverbed. For this particular blast, 100 holes were drilled. Never does anyone except a construction engineer have the opportunity to witness this so close. Compressed air blows the holes clean. Dynamite. The to put thejob is electric fuses into sticks of dynamite. Its ticklish work and calls for a steady hand and plenty of nerves. Stick with the fuse in it is lowered into the holes. Go easy there, fella, thats dynamite. Sand is poured in and tamped down. Led into theires central switch. Electric shovels begin cleaning up immediately after the blast. The rock is loaded into trucks and rolled away. Meanwhile, the u. S. Army engineers have built a navigation block on the opposite bank of the river. The lock will have a lift of 53 feet. Sand and gravel for wheeler dam is obtained from the riverbed. These buckets drop it into a screening plant where it is sifted into assorted sizes and poured into separate barges which are then taken upstream to the wheeler site and mourned alongside the floating cranes and concrete mixtures. In the absence of rail connection, all material and equipment comes to wheeler by water. A crane lifts great buckets full of gravel. The batcher and the mixer are mounted on a steel barge. When mixed another crane swings its bucket to the point where the concrete is to be deposited. Forms have been prepared. Steel reinforcing rods are ready to be embedded in the concrete. Over 600,000 cubic yards will be required to complete wheeler dam. The crane goes back for more. Latestother authoritys project is near shiloh battlefield in tennessee. Begin, anstruction can study of the foundation had to be made just like at wheeler and noris. This part of the process is known as core drilling. A steel cylinder with a ring attached to the end bores its way into the bedrock. It exposes a core. The process is just like coring and apple. This. Ngineering requires they cost 2500 each and wear out after a few months use. The core is carefully removed and a notation is made of the depth from which the specimen came. Samples are taken to the laboratory for tests and analysis. The core is one of many checks on the stability of the foundation. Marsh grass and driftwood make ideal breeding grounds for malaria carrying mosquitoes. Patrols cruise along the shorelines spraying a film of oil on the water. This mixture is entirely harmless to men and fish is deadly to the mosquitoes. Just one of many ways tba is cooperating with local tva is cooperating with local authorities. Of the major objectives of the Tennessee ValleyAuthority Act is the readjustment and use of nitrate class number two at of muscle shoals. The act calls for active research and investments in new processes. The most challenging problem today is securing the phosphorus. As a nation, we do not yet onlize the entire the tax phosphorus. The chief source is the vast accumulated remains of prehistoric animals whose bones have long since gone back into the art back into the earth. When no thought is given to the future welfare of the land, reducese strip mining desolation such as this. Under the old system, the top soil was scraped off and the rock was extracted and the site was abandoned. Proper regard for the land might have caused the replacement of the topsoil. Is thinking of the future. Allowining methods will the future generation to tell. The supply is so restricted that it has been deemed possible to claim the phosphorus located in the bed. Phosphorus is the limiting factor in plant food all of the world and the most important element in soil preservation rehabilitation. As crops are grown and grains are marketed or fed to animals which in turn are shipped to market, phosphorus will leave the land forever. This is an untouched foster phosphorus bed. You will never be able to tell that the phosphate rock has been extracted. The method is to remove the topsoil and take out the raw phosphate rock. Later, the topsoil is replaced in the land returned to agriculture. The farmers themselves are mining the rock for the tva. Phosphate for them is another cash crop but if phosphorus is not readily is not made millions of tons of grains and meat. Every kernel of grain and spec of bone contains phosphorus. Small pitifully percentages ever returned to the soil. This must be restored if our plant and animal life are to be maintained. Mind, it is taken to the riverbed and poured down chutes into barges. Here is a good, close view of this allimportant element. Is full, it is towed to the fertilizer plant where the rock is transferred to the hopper cars and taken to the pile. The whole journey is made by rail. Let us look at the pilot demonstration plant that the tva has installed. First, the rocket is dried. And then it is weighed and mixed in this scale house and placed in storage bins. High temperatures change the phosphorus into a gas and it is passed through a. And placed in acid tanks. Manufacturing plant will be adequate for any demonstration this fertilizer production desires. Phosphate is of vital importance in the control of soil erosion. In this field, a version has already set in. And here is what happens when a erosion is left unchecked. The topsoil is gone and the land is destroyed. Of acres have already been lost and there is no time to lose. Is a series of check dams in an extensive protest and an Extensive Program is already underway. One method is a series of check dams and an Extensive Program is already underway. Over the gully slopes. A tangle of wires. Where erosion has badly started, they will save the land. 50 counties already have terracing units at work in the valley area and more are coming in all the time. A terracing crew with tractor and scraper will check the beginnings of erosion. Will cost the farmer 1. 50 up to two dollars for the farmer per acre. A broad swath is cut extending clear across the field. Then the second cut is made some 20 feet downhill from the first. These two cuts market the boundary of the terrace. The beauty of this message of this method is that no topsoil is wasted. Followhe terraces contour lines, the rain is caught and held. Complete a terrace and will beth and final cut a barrier to the rainfall. And here is a finished field with 1, 2, 3, 4 broad terraces of against it saving this land for all time. Let us follow this line across the hills to tupelo, mississippi. The first to contract with tva power. The main street. The courthouse. The city hall. And the mayor reviewing figures showing that with power costing an average of 55 less than it originally did, sales increased in less than a year. They are learning more the lessons of electricity. Tupelo is not the only city to profit. 10. 35. Look at his bills. From a substation such as this, the Tennessee Valley authority is pushing lines into Rural Communities and thousands of counties in america have never enjoyed electricity. This is bringing the medium that will lessen or lighten the drudgery of housework. The power lies in the might of the river. The cross arms swinging into place. And the insulator is securely fastened. Be tied in tightly ause high winds and storms states that the business of distributing electric energy is a private business. Private and Public Interests in the interest of power are a different kind from quality. The interest of the public is superior to any private interests. Private interest and Public Interest conflict, the Public Interest must prevail. If the conflict can be reconciled without interest to the Public Interest without injury to the Public Interest reconciliation can be made. But this is undeniable. This is one of the measures that the people may properly take to protect themselves against unreasonable rates. Not enough. One are through its agency, the authority, the tva is making possible a wider use of electricity through a broader use of electric appliances. The authority does not sell a single appliance but it collaborates with manufacturers and with retailers and utilities , high greatcost utilities into homes. Electric ranges, water heaters, pumps, refrigerators and a host of other electrical appliances have been mobilized to ease human burden but also to lift the depression providing employment to untold numbers of workers. The meter is installed and times are changing. New waves new ways art replacing the old. Let us contrast yesterday with tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. Archivalatch our films on Public Affairs in their entirety on our weekly series reel america saturday at 10 00 p. M. And sunday at 4 00 p. M. East turn here on American History tv. This is American History tv on cspan3. Where each week and we feature 48 hours of programs exploring our nations past. You are watching American History tv, 48 hours of programming on American History tv on American History every weekend on cspan3. Ill was on twitter for information on our schedule and to keep up with the latest history news. Workxt on railamerica, we again. In 1937 film promoting new deal programs that put unemployed africanamericans to work in infrastructure, health care, education, and the arts. The final four minutes of the film shows the final scene of a federal theater production of mcbath with an africanamerican cast. The play was directed by orson welles and on the Opening Night 10,000play in 1936, people crowded the streets of harlem in an effort to score a ticket. Only a few years ago, we were a discouraged people because we were forced to lose our jobs when old man depression came along. We struggled tga