My digital photos of the original hydroelectric project on the upper Skagit River have been accepted by Seattle City Electric. The submittal also included a historical narrative, and more photos by the consulting firm Northwest Vernacular. The Seattle Municipal Archives will also be getting full sized digital files for the images, which are in the public domain. As I wrote in a previous post, this was the first hydro project in the upper Skagit, providing electricity for the construction of the first big dam, the Gorge Dam, and for the worker’s village at Newhalem.
After more than a hundred years, the old turbines and generator are still in working order, but there are other problems with the little hydro project, and I’m sorry to write that it will probably be removed. I don’t have access to all the reports, and I don’t know all the issues, but it seems that maintaining reliable access to the diversion dam and headworks is one of the problems. After a wildfire went through the area, a landslide closed the access road. We had quite a scramble getting over it to reach the diversion dam on foot. It would be a major project to remove the landslide, and to stabilize the slope above it.
I am grateful for the opportunity to explore this project from headworks to distribution lines. The engineers and workers of 1920 -1921 did an amazing job.
left (north) side of the channel.
and black increments are one foot.
