Saturday-April 27,1940
Our party, with the exception of Mr.Neish and accompanied by Mr. L.J. Gallagher and Mr.J.A.Clark, drove in Mr. Clark's
car from Spokane, Wash. to Pasco, Wash..by way of Coulee Dam, leaving Spokane at 7:30 A.M., arriving at Pasco at 9:00 P.M.
The Northern Pacific Railway Company handles considerable traffic for the Coulee Dam project, which consists
princpallyat this time of cement in bulk loaded in box cars. This operation is carried on from Coulee City to Mason City
(Coulee Damsite) by contractor over approximately 30 miles of
railroad constructed by the United States Goverment from Odair to
Damsite.
Many units of freight train cars loaded with cement were
inspected. An item of particular interest was noted at the unloading
platform at Damsite, wherein a remote control electrically driven
pneumatic
cement unloading device is used, which works directly onto
the boxcar and picks up the cement by a screw conveyor and
raises it to the air chamber and then into the near-by silos through an
8-inch
rubber conduit. The device is, in fact, a robot, which moves
either forward,backward, or to the right or left as desired by the operator who remains on the platform. It is presumed that
this device was especially devised for this job,as box cars only
are available and has greatly improved since it was first used.
Cement unloading area at the dam.
Cement unloading area at the dam.
Photo courtesy of Jay Kemble.
Photo courtesy of Jay Kemble.
Photo courtesy of the Rufus Woods Collection.
