Made Wonders in the US

The Golden Gate Bridge, the Brooklyn Bridge, the Gateway Arch, Mount Rushmore, Hoover Dam, the Mesa Verde Cliff Dwellings, and the Space Needle
Download MP3 (Right-click or option-click the link.) I'm Faith Lapidus. And I'm Steve Ember with EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English. There are many natural wonders in the United States. Today, we take you to seven man-made wonders in America.Against the city's gleaming spires, Above the ships that ply the stream, A bridge of haunting beauty stands Fulfillment of an artist's dream. That poem is about our first man-made wonder -- the Brooklyn Bridge in New York City. It extends more than 480 meters over the East River to connect the areas of Brooklyn and Manhattan. A famous bridge builder David B. Steinman wrote the poem. But he did not build the Brooklyn Bridge. It was the dream of another man, John A. Roebling. He was a member of the design team and became chief engineer of the building project in 1867. Sadly, he became sick and died before work even started. He had an accident when visiting the area where the bridge was to be built Building began in 1870. It was very dangerous. Few records were kept on such events. But, historians say between 20 and 30 men died as a result of the building project. Some died from falling off the bridge or from being struck by equipment. Others died or were injured from working in the structures called caissons. These lay deep below the surface of the Earth. The workers would get a pressure sickness called the bends. John Roebling's son, Washington, was severely disabled by the bends. He had been named chief engineer of the Brooklyn Bridge project soon after his father died. Washington Roebling continued the work from his home after he was disabled.

The Brooklyn Bridge opened on May 24, 1883. At the time, it was the longest suspension bridge in the world. It is still a beautiful structure. The bridge has tens of thousands of suspension wires that spread many meters across and up and down to towers on each side. From a distance the many wires look like the stringed musical instrument called the harp. The center of the Brooklyn Bridge rises almost 40 meters above the East River. It is one of the most famous and beloved New York City landmarks.Another bridge makes our list of the seven man-made wonders. This one is in northern California. The Golden Gate Bridge is named after the waterway it crosses. The Golden Gate Strait lies between the Pacific Ocean and the San Francisco Bay. The bridge over it links the city of San Francisco with Marin County. Joseph Strauss was the chief engineer of the Golden Gate Bridge. Building began in 1933. The bridge opened in 1937. It is almost 1,300 meters long. It was the longest suspension bridge in the world for almost 30 years. Then, in 1964, the larger Verrazano Narrows bridge opened in New York City. Joseph Strauss used newly developed protective equipment for the men who worked on the bridge. These included a special safety net under the bridge. But still, 11 men were killed during construction The color of the bridge, International Orange, is very important. It was chosen partly because it is easier to see through the heavy fog that often covers San Francisco. Many people consider the Golden Gate Bridge the most beautiful bridge structure in the world. Joseph Strauss wrote a poem about his bridge when the work was done. Here is a part of "The Mighty Task is Done": At last the mighty task is done; Resplendent in the western sun The Bridge looms mountain high; Its titan piers grip ocean floor, Its great steel arms link shore with shore, Its towers pierce the sky.Our next man-made wonder is as famous a landmark in the Midwest United States as the first two are on the East and West Coasts. The Gateway Arch in Saint Louis, Missouri is the tallest

freestanding monument in the nation. The shiny, steel curve rises to almost 200 meters. Below, the arch is exactly as wide as it is tall. The famous Finnish American building designer, Eero Saarinen, designed the Gateway Arch during a national competition in the late 1940s. However, building did not begin until February, 1963. It was completed in October, 1965. Later a transport system was added to permit people to visit an observation area inside the top of the arch. The Gateway Arch rises above the Mississippi River. It was named in honor of Saint Louis, which was historically called "The Gateway to the West."There is one place in America that almost everyone agrees is a manmade wonder: South Dakota's Mount Rushmore Giant faces of four great American presidents are cut into the rock near the top of Mount Rushmore in the Black Hills. Each face is about 18 meters high. Sculptor Gutzon Borglum was chosen to create the Mount Rushmore memorial. It was completed in 1941, after 14 years. Each president represents important values in America. George Washington led the cause for independence. Thomas Jefferson represented the belief in equality. Abraham Lincoln ended slavery and saved the Union. And Theodore Roosevelt was a conservationist and symbol of the progressive spirit of America.We go next to one of the largest and most difficult structures ever built in the United States: Hoover Dam. The dam is in the Black Canyon, near Las Vegas, Nevada. It controls the water of the Colorado River and produces electric power. Workers began to build Hoover Dam in 1931. They finished in just five years. More than 20,000 men worked on the project. It was very dangerous. Ninety-six workers were killed. Many others were injured. The Hoover Dam is 221 meters tall. It weighs more than six and one half million tons. At the time, it was the largest and tallest dam in the world. And it was one of the largest producers of electric power ever built. Hoover Dam also created Lake Mead, the largest man-made lake in AmericaAnother man-made wonder of the United States was built long

before the nation was established. About 900 years ago, the Ancestral Puebloan people built villages high in the walls of canyons in Mesa Verde, Colorado. Six hundred cliff dwellings are now part of the Mesa Verde National Park. Visitors can stand at the top of the mesas and look into the dwellings almost hidden in openings of the rock walls. The Puebloan people cut small steps into the rock. A series of such steps connected buildings containing hundreds of rooms. The rock walls have protected the buildings from severe weather in the area. So they remain mostly unchanged in the hundreds of years since they were built.Our final man-made wonder is in the northwestern city of Seattle, Washington. The Space Needle was built as the central structure for the 1962 World's Fair. Edward Carlson designed the 184 meter tall structure. The Space Needle has a wide base on the ground. It is narrow in the middle. On top is a large ring-like structure. The structure was meant to look like a "flying saucer," a vehicle that was popular in science fiction space travel stories. The saucer includes an observation area and eating place. The restaurant slowly turns to provide visitors with a 360 degree view of Seattle. The Space Needle was not very costly. The building project cost about 4,500,000 dollars. It was designed and completed in about a year and opened on the first day of the World's Fair. Today, the Space Needle is the most popular place for visitors to Seattle. And it remains the internationally known symbol of the city.This program was written and produced by Caty Weaver. I'm Faith Lapidus. And I'm Steve Ember. You can read and listen to this program on our Web site, voaspecialenglish.com. Join us again next week for EXPLORATIONS in VOA Special English. About Places in VOA Special English www.manythings.org/voa/places

Source: Visiting 7 Man-Made Wonders in the US Hoover Dam (Near Las Vegas, Nevada) Download MP3 (Right-click or option-click the link.) This is Bob Doughty. And this is Steve Ember with EXPLORATIONSin VOA Special English. Today we tell about Hoover Dam. It was the largest and most difficult structure of its kind ever built when work started in 1931.Our report today about Hoover Dam must begin with the Colorado River. This river made the dam necessary. The Colorado River begins high in the Rocky Mountains. It begins slowly, during the dark months of winter. Heavy snow falls on the Rocky Mountains. The snow is so deep in some areas that it will stay on the ground well into the hot days of summer. But the snow does melt. Ice cold water travels down the mountains and forms several rivers -- the Gila River, the Green River, the Little Colorado, the San Juan, the Virgin and the Gunnison rivers. These rivers link together and form the beginnings of the Colorado River. The Colorado River flows through, or provides water for, the states of Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada and California. Then it crosses the border into Mexico. The Colorado River has always been extremely powerful. The river created the huge Grand Canyon. The violent water cut hundreds of meters deep into the desert floor of Arizona. The Grand Canyon is proof of the power of this great river. The Grand Canyon was cut into the desert floor beginning thousands of years ago. But the power of this river has been demonstrated in more modern times. Between 1905 and 1907, the Colorado River caused great amounts of flooding in parts of Arizona and California. Huge amounts of water ran into a low area in the dry, waterless desert that had once been an ancient lake. In two years of flooding, the Colorado River filled the ancient lake. That lake is called the Salton Sea. Today, it is about 56 kilometers long by 25 kilometers wide. It is even larger in years of heavy rain.

The flooding that created the Salton Sea also flooded homes, towns and farming areas. Many people were forced to flee their homes. Government leaders knew they had to do something to prevent such floods in the future. In 1918, a man named Arthur Davis proposed building a dam to control the Colorado River. Mr. Davis was a government engineer. He said the dam should be built in an area called Boulder Canyon on the border between the states of Arizona and Nevada Building the dam would not be a simple matter. The people of seven states and the people of Mexico needed and used the water of the Colorado River. Much of that area is desert land. Water is extremely important. Without water from the Colorado River, farming is not possible. Without water, life in the desert is not possible. On November 24, 1922, officials signed a document in Santa Fe, New Mexico. That document is called the Colorado River Compact. The document tells how the seven states would share the water of the Colorado River. It was agreed this could be more easily done with the aid of a dam. Later an agreement was signed with Mexico to supply it with water from the Colorado River.The area chosen for the dam was called Black Canyon. The walls of Black Canyon rise almost 243 meters above the river. An ancient volcano formed the rock in Black Canyon. Engineers decided the rock would provide a good strong support for the proposed dam. However, the area also presented problems. The nearest railroad was 60 kilometers away. There was no electric power. And, in the summer, the temperature in the desert in Black Canyon could reach as high as 48 degrees Celsius. A great deal of work was done before operations started on the dam. Workers built a town called Boulder City to house employees working on the dam. They built a large road from Boulder City to the area of the dam. They built a railroad from a main line in Las Vegas, Nevada, to Boulder City. They built another railroad from Boulder City to the dam area. And they built a 350 kilometer power line from San Bernadino, California. This provided electric power to the area where the dam was being built. The work on the dam began in April of 1931. Workers called "high scalers" were some of the first to begin building the dam. They were suspended from

ropes as they used heavy air-powered hammers to break any loose rock away from the face of the canyon walls. When they could not use hammers, they used dynamite. One high scaler became very famous. His name was Arnold Parks. He caught another worker who had fallen off the top of the canyon. Mr. Parks held the worker to the wall of the canyon until others came to help. Today, visitors can see a statue of the men who worked as high scalers to build Hoover Dam. The high scalers worked on the sides of the canyon. Other workers dug huge tunnels deep in the floor of the canyon. This was done to permit the Colorado River to flow away from the construction area. This had to be done so the floor of the dam could be built. On June 6, 1933, workers poured the first load of a building material called concrete. Men in two special factories worked day and night to make the concrete building material for the dam. Huge equipment moved millions of tons of rock and sand. In the summer months, the terrible desert heat slowed the work but did not stop it. Men who worked at night on the dam suffered less, but the heat was still as high as 30 degrees Celsius. Slowly the great dam began to rise from the floor of the canyon. From the canyon floor it reaches 221 meters high. Workers poured the last of the concrete on May 29, 1935. They had used almost four million cubic meters of concrete in the dam. Workers also used more than 20 million kilograms of steel to strengthen the concrete in the dam. The work was dangerous for the more than 5,000 men who worked on the structure. The extreme temperatures, falling objects and heavy equipment caused accidents. The workers were provided with medical care and two emergency vehicles to take them to a new hospital in Boulder City. However, 96 men lost their lives during the building of the great dam. The companies building the dam had been given seven years to complete the work. They did it in only five. The dam was finished on March 1, 1936. Other work now began. This work would make the dam into one of the largest producers of electric power ever built. The dam was built to control the

powerful Colorado River. But it was also meant to use the river to produce large amounts of electric power. Today, 17 huge machines use the river's power to produce electric power. The states of Arizona and Nevada share the power. So do many cities in California, including Los Angeles, Burbank and Pasadena.When the Hoover Dam was finished in 1936, it was the largest dam in the world. It was also the tallest. And it was the largest power producer that used water power to make electricity. Today this is no longer true. Taller dams, larger dams and a few that produce more power have been created. But Hoover Dam is still a huge and interesting place. Visitors to Hoover Dam drive on a small road that passes Lake Mead. They enter a special visitors' center to learn about the dam and the men who built it. They ride high-speed elevators that go deep inside the dam. They see the huge machines that produce electric power. Many visitors say they thought the name of the huge structure was Boulder Dam. They are told that Hoover Dam is often called Boulder Dam. However, it is named after former President Herbert Hoover. Before he was president, Mr. Hoover worked for many years to make the construction of the dam possible. It was officially named to honor him in 1947. Visitors leave the great dam with an understanding of how difficult the project was. They learn that it still safely controls the great Colorado River. And it also provides water and electric power to millions of people in the American southwest.This program was written by Paul Thompson. It was produced by Mario Ritter. This is Steve Ember. And this is Bob Doughty. Join us again next week for anotherEXPLORATIONS program in VOA Special English. View Larger Map You can also listen to the 2010 version of this "Hoover Dam" story which is slightly different and has Shireley Griffith's voice. The new version, also talks about the Mike O'Callaghan-Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge built in 2010.

<= Back [ Page 2 ] Next => 2009-08-11 About Places in VOA Special English www.manythings.org/voa/places Source: Hoover Dam, Finished in 1936, Is Still a Hugely Interesting Place TEXT = http://www.voanews.com/specialenglish/archive/2009-08/2009-0811-voa1.cfm?renderforprint=1 MP3 = http://www.voanews.com/mediaassets/specialenglish/2009_08/audio/Mp3 /se-exp-hoover-dam-12aug09_0.Mp3