Talk:Ocoee Dam No. 1

Disputed date claims via National Register of Historic Places

• I added a Disputed tag to this Wiki article with regard to the stated completion dates that are not supported by online information that is easily referenced at the U.S. Department of Interior National Register of Historic Places web site - the assertions are as follows:

Completed in 1911, Ocoee No. 1 was one of the first hydroelectric projects in Tennessee, and remains the oldest dam in the TVA system.

Built 1910-1911 (from the Infobox)

TVA (the Tennessee Valley Authority) acquired both the Wilbur Dam and the Ocoee No. 1 Dam after its own agency creation by the U.S. federal government during the early 1930s.

The National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Section number E, pages 12-13 from the "Pre-TVA Hydroelectric Development in Tennessee, 1901-19", U.S. Department of Interior. clearly shows the following information pertaining to both the Wilbur Dam being completed and on-line with hydropower production than the Ocooe No1 Dam:

Section number E, page 13:

Ocoee No. 1 was the first hydroelectric facility in the state of Tennessee large enough to provide power to Chattanooga and other regional cities. In December 1911, the Eastern Tennessee Power Company was nearing the completion of the first hydroelectric generating facility on the Ocoee River at Parksville, Tennessee. Actual work began in 1910, and the first concrete was poured in 1911. The plant began operation on January 27, 1912, and has operated ever since. The dam is a gravity type with a curvilinear design, and the first power was delivered on January 27, 1912. It was to serve the interstate-electrical needs of Cleveland, Chattanooga, Athens, Sweetwater, Loudon, Lenoir City, and Knoxville, Tennessee, as well as those of Rome and Dalton, Georgia...

Suggesting that the power company finished construction sometime closer to the actual January 27, 1912 first date of hydrogenerated electric power at this dam, while an the preceeding page of the "Pre-TVA Hydroelectric Development in Tennessee, 1901-19" report by the National Register of Historical Places offers the following information to the earlier Wilbur Dam completion and initial power production:

Section number E, page 12:

A confident, University of Tennessee professor of experimental engineering, John A. Switzer, optimistically reported in February, 1912, that the "year 1912 will be notable in the annals of Tennessee, because it marks the beginning of a new era - the era of water power development." Switzer claimed that "the inauguration of the Watauga Power Company's plant in Carter County, and of the Eastern Tennessee Power Company's in Polk [County] are of greater significance than we are likely to realize." This was because "it means the inevitable, and the prompt expansion of our manufacturing interests; since the certainty of obtaining power at a low cost will assuredly attract manufacturing enterprise." On a larger scale were the early hydroelectric power developments in the eastern part of the state, and noted for their potential as a source for hydroelectric power production. By November 1911, the Watauga Power Company had completed its hydro-plant at the "horse-shoe" on the Watauga River, 6 miles above Elizabethton. According to one contemporary account "the people of Bristol and Elizabethton do not yet fully realize the magnitude and importance of the enterprise." The dam and site were later purchased by the TVA. This hydroelectric site was, in large measure, responsible for attracting industry to the Elizabethton/Bristol area, in the form of woodworking, textile, and copper refining plants. Indeed, boosters in Elizabethton soon advertised the town as "the City of Power" as a result of the development."

Pre-TVA Hydroelectric Development in Tennessee, 1901-19 National Register of Historic Places Continuation Sheet Section number E, pages 12-13. U.S. Department of Interior. http://pdfhost.focus.nps.gov/docs/NRHP/Text/64500614.pdf Bee Cliff River Slob (talk) 18:41, 13 February 2015 (UTC)

TVA's website gives Ocoee's completion year as 1911 [1]. The two TVA technical reports cited in the references section give Ocoee's "Year of Closure" as 1911, and noted that "commercial operation" of its units began in January 1912. The Jones source cited (which is 404'd, even in archive.org) reported December 1911 as its completion. I'll investigate further. We'll keep 1911 as the completion year unless there is something more definitive, but the "oldest dam" statement will have to go, in light of the Wilbur info. Bms4880 (talk) 20:05, 13 February 2015 (UTC)