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About Medford mail tribune. (Medford, Or.) 1909-1989 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 18, 1962)
," MEDFORD MAIL TRIBUNE. MFPFOBP. OREC-.t THURSDAY. OCTOBER 18. 1962 g J Project Envisioned 40 Years Ago Becoming Reality in Arkansas Basin KANSAS MUSOUKI :-- SEE! HEAR! MEET! ' 1 rv', jr V. 1 ' K LA H 0 M A sjllv? T9S7 i ' 8U JSbJ " j MAP OF PROJECT Waters of the winding expansion to the Arkansas river basin. This Arkansas and Verdigris rivers will be har- newsmap shows area and location of three of nessed by a complex of locks and dams to the dams, Kcyston, Oologah and Dardanelle create a waterway to the Mississippi river (triangles). (UPI) that should provide a gold mine of economic - By EDWARD McMANUS United Press International Tulsa, Okla. -IUPII Nearly ' 40 years ago, Newt Graham tood by the lazy Arkansas river and had a vision. He saw reservoirs and dams in eastern Oklahoma and Arkansas, harnessing the waters of the winding stream. He saw huge barges moving up and dowp the river carry ing oil, wheat, minerals, mer chandise. And with this, his dream pictured a gold mine of economic expansion for the ' Arkansas River basin. People laughed at Graham, but his dream is coming true. And the development ;nay reach far beyond what he hoped for: A barge trip on the muddy Arkansas may be the first leg of a voyage to the moon. Work Under Way Work is well under way toward making navigable the Arkansas and one of its main tributaries, the Verdigris riv er in Oklahoma. The cost, by present calculations, will be S1.2 billion - more expensive than the great St. Lawrence Seaway and three times the cost of the Panama canal. The job is to be finished, from the Mississippi river to a point near Tulsa, by 1970. By that time, North Amer ican Aviation expects to have a plant cast of Tulsa turning out moon rocket components. Water transportation is a must for North American's operations. The huge rocket fuselages and other items of space hardware the company will be putting out arc much too big to fit on a truck on any highway, or on a railroad car. But a Saturn rocket I DREAMT I ""1 f-i WAS SLLLOItU FOR SNOW'S (Only (he best make ill FOOD IS v MDF0Mv2&ik -.Tribune booster, 3a feiH to diameter and 80 feet long, would fit snugly on a big barge lor the trip to the Mississippi, through the Gulf of .vlcxico to Cape Canaveral, Final Phasi Starti Recently the final phnse of construction began At the site of the Oologah dam and ec ervoir north of Tulsa. The Oologah is one of four major units now under construction in the navigation project. In time its reservoir will cover the birthplace of humorist Will Rogers, 3'i miles above the dam site, due for comple tion next yea The Oooioiiah d.im will control the flow of Wilier into the Verdigris, which winds through northeast Okliihoma to the city of Muskogee, where it meets the Grand and Arkansas rivers. From the little town of Catoosa, just east of Tulsa, to Mus kogee, 40 miles south, the banks of the Verdigris will be stabilized and the channel will be narrowed and straight ened, to permit barge traffic. From Muskogee southeast ward nearly 500 miles to the Mississippi river, the same thing will be done on the Arkansas. Cheap Transportation The net result will be s waterway providing cheap transportation, whether it be for moon rockets, oil ot wheat moving out of the area or steel and other products be ing brought in 10 supply tlu expanding industry of the basin. Only a few of Ui2 men wh; envisioned this pro.ioct in the 1920s are still alive. The leader was the late Newton R. Graham, who took charge of a Tulsa chamber of com merce committee for water ri'sources in 1925. Graham was born near the banks of the Arkansas - but many miles upstream from Tulsa, at Pueblo, Colo. He started out in the newspaper business as a copv boy at Kansas City, Mo., and later moved to OkUhoma as an ad vertising man for the old Tulsa Democrat. Then he went into banking, and eventually became presi dent of the Tulsa Clearing House association. Talking Navigation Graham started t a 1 k i n g Arkansas navigation long be fore most of his contempora ries considered it a possibil ity. Scoffers used to suggest that Newt put his energies into paving the Arkansas in stead, to make a highway out of it. Admirers called him WELCOME TOTHEWNDOFPIENTV Guess what foreign visitors want to see in America. Our tall buildings, pretty women and a grocery store. They're alwayi amazed at the variety and abundance. At the free choice of fooda from all over the country and world. And from all seasons. At the high quality, freshness and exciting conven ience built into so many products. At the stores themselves. The sheer fun ol shop ping in such sparkling clean, beautifully lighted and laid.out food centers. They see the American grocery as the instant "Land of Plenty." They'd be even more tmaied If they aw the efficiency behind all this. For we Americans spend a smaller share of our income than ever (and about hall what Frenchman has to spend!) for tood. A BARGAIN "the admiral of the Arkan sas." Graham gradually won supporters and kept close contact with congressmen from Oklahoma and Arkan sas. He made innumerable trips to Washington to urge the U.S. Army Corps of Engi neers, the Interior department and the congress to look into his plans. Graham died of a heart attack i- 1957. He had spent the day attending a meeting of the Oklahoma Planning and Resources board, which has played a big part in set ting up the project. If Graham spearheaded the early days of planning the navigation project, S?n. Rob ert S. Kerr of Oklahoma has led the congressional battle for money to make it a re ality. Already Reaping Profits For landlocked Oklahoma and western Arkansas, the project already is reaping profits. Along the way, some ranch ers and farmers have had their own personal dreams shattered as the construction crews moved in to buil ' the dams and create the massive reservoirs which will inun date their land. Some entire communities very small ones-will be either eliminated or relocated. But these problems have not been major, and in most cases, property owners have prof iled financially. The benefits appear to outweigh greatly any disad vantages. The corps of engi neers has forecast economic benefits of S64.5 million an nually from the multi-purpose development of the Arkansas basin. Nearly two-thirds of this total is expected to come from the 13 million tons ot commerce forecast 'o move annually. Other benefits will be derived from hydroelectric power, flood control, recrea tional uses and the saving of riverbank land through bank stabilization. Recreation Attractive Recreation alone has been an attractive outgrowth of the navigation project and its companion water projects built in the area over the years, before the navigation work got approval in Wash ington. Boating and fi?hing have made Arkansas and east ern Oklahoma popular tourist areas. North American, which ex pects to employ 10.000 to 12.000 persons at its Tulsa plant eventually, is not the only company planning to make use of the river trans portation. Aveo Manufacturing com pany has set up an aerospace research facility here; Sunray DX Oil company, headquar tered at Tulsa, will ure the Arkansas to transport much of the oil it now moves by pipeline; John Deere Chem ical company and Dewey Portland Cement company both chose the Tulsa area to locate plants, with the idea in mind of future river navi gation. Other cities on the routc Muskogee, Fort Smith, Ark., and Little Rock-also are at tracting new industry. Population is expected to mount rapidly with comple tion of the navigation proj ect. The army engineers pre dict that the Tulsa county population, set at 346.038 by the 1960 census, will increase to 420.000 by 1970, t- 520,000 by 1980 and to 1,200.000 by the year 2020. The engineers have pre dicted population jumps for Coffeyville and Independence, Kennedy Please note our new IT'S NEW! IT 770 - f ' ", '.t p ejf tttafjM ft TAKING SHAPE A project that was en- kansas river west of Tulsa. The dam, one of visioned in the 1920s to create a navigable 11 in the project, is scheduled for completion waterway from near Tulsa, Okla, to the Mis- In 1964. Navigation from the Mississippi in sissippi river begins to take shape as giant the Arkansas river basin will be a reality by cranes work on Keystone Cam in the Ar- 1970. (UPI) Kan., among others. The proj ect is expected to have a wide economic impact - affecting central and western Okla homa, southern Kansas and southwest Missouri as well. Not Alwayi Landlocked Oklahoma and Arkansas have not always been land locked. Indians and French traders made use of the river with dugout canoes and steam boats plied the waters of the Arkansas early in the 19th century. The heyday of the river- boat was in the 1840s and 1850s and the boat whistle was a familiar sound at such ports as Napoleon, Little Rock, Van Buren and Fort Smith, Ark., and Fort Gib son, Okla. But low water and sand bars hampered the traffic, and the end of the paddle wheelers was signaled on Christmas day, 1871, when the first KATY (Missouri-Kansas-Texas railroad) loco motive crossed the Arkansas. Ironically, it is the railroad industry that stands to lose the most from rcvitalization of the Arkansas river. The trains just can't move freight as cheaply as water transpor tation. Paddlewheel Boat Fire Injures 18 Dallas-iliPH-Thc inboard mo tor of the paddlewheel boat "Dixie Bell" exploded Tues day night during a pleasure cruise on a lagoon at the State Fair of Texas, injuring at least 18 persons. A puff of blue flame shot up,' partially burning the 20-foot-long canopy covered boat. Witnesses said the 20 occu pants of the craft tumbled into the five-foot-deep lagoon walcr. Six persons waded Into the water and pulled the boat to shore. The flames were ex tinguished quickly. Telemeters Useful for Testing Autos North Hollywood, Calif. -HPli - The same type of equip ment used to check on earth- orbiting satellites and missiles is helping automobile engin eers make cars quieter. To get an accurate check on all noise and vibration, car manufacturers can use a two channel electronic telemetry system that "listens" to the sounds test cars make on the road and transmits signals to a sensitive receiver in a fol lowing vehicle. 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