WOULDN'T IT BE NICE & THEY DON'T BUILD LIKE THIS ANYMORE

WOULDN'T IT BE NICE

    Now the Obama vs Romney match is on, we may get an opportunity to see a national debate about the role, scope and intent of the federal government.  Though both are Harvard men and technocrats, they apparently possess different visions.  It would be nice if the campaign remained focused on that.  Sadly though, it appears big money, super pacs and huge advertising budgets will steal the plot and establish the tone and probable shallowness of the campaign.

      It would be nice if the media would forego being manipulated and spun by the ad dollars and their masters. Better if they'd stop the pundit pontificating and over zealous devotion to the "horse race" and odds sequences and shape the discussion about visions of America's future and how we get there via the Romney or Obama route.

      Wouldn't it be nice?

DAY BOOK

BUILT TO LAST
I was impressed by what I call "Federal Style" grandeur evident in the building at the Hoover Dam.  Buildings constructed in the 1930's remain impressive today in 
their stateliness, sense of artistic design and that little touch of deco.

Someone makes sure, but even today those

brass doors shine like new.

And after 70 years the marble with brass inlay "signs" are 

as classy as anything new.

SOME TIMES OLD CAN'T LAST
Here's a quick tribute to a tree that was a young windbreak
about the time of the Hoover Dam construction.

See you down the trail.

A WONDER OF THE WORLD

ONE OF THE WONDERS?

     The sculptures at the Hoover Dam are the centerpiece of a tile inlayed plaza that is a type of earth calendar and cosmic communication piece.  It places the Hoover Dam in a league with the Pyramids and the Roman Coliseum. And
there is some truth to that.

   More than a hundred humans lost their lives in the building of the Boulder Dam from 1931 to 1935.  Later dedicated to former President Herbert Hoover, it was the largest concrete project ever undertaken and employed thereto for untested techniques.  It remains a colossal achievement.

    Built in Black Canyon on the Colorado River, it impounds Lake Meade.  Constructed under President Franklin Roosevelt, it is a hydroelectric generation source. A consortium of parties, Six Companies, won the bid and built the project for around $42 Million.  They finished almost a year early.
    Nearly a million people visit the Hoover Dam, now a tourist site as well.  Highway 93 used to run across the top of the dam, but the traffic has now been diverted to another amazing construct, the by pass bridge, just recently opened.

    Here on the border of Nevada and Arizona are a couple of
examples of human endeavor, built large and indeed planetary markers.

See you down the trail.