History Menu

     MRP100’s goal for this web site is for it to become a virtual museum about our great dam and power house across the Mississippi River. We hope visitors will find the site educational, full of research material as well as entertaining.
     Dictionary: A dam is a barrier to obstruct the flow of water, especially one of earth, masonry or concrete, built across a stream or river.
     Wikipedia; A dam is a barrier that impounds water or underground streams. Dams generally serve the primary purpose of retaining water, while other structures such as floodgates or levees (also known as dikes) are used to manage or prevent water flow into specific land regions. Hydropower and pumped-storage hydroelectricity are often used in conjunction with dams to generate electricity. A dam can also be used to collect water or for storage of water which can be evenly distributed between locations.

For the researcher using this site, it will be helpful to see the Keokuk-Hamilton Dam in context to other dams built around the same time. Comparing size, construction techniques, locations, and purpose for of the dams gives some similarities but many differences. Also important is how the dams were financed, using public or private money.

The dams and power plants chosen for comparison here were built from 1890 to 1927. A time of industrial revolution which fostered the need for more and more electric generation. Towns and cities were changing from gas lights to electric. Factories were going from steam power to electric motors. If your city was near a river hydroelectric generation was a reasonable and cost effective choice. See the chart on Comparison of Dams.

Black Eagle Dam
   1890-1891
   Great Falls, Montana

Buffalo Bill Dam
   1904-1910
   Cody, Wyoming

Roosevelt Dam
1905-1911
Central Arizona

New Croton Dam
1892 -1906
New York, New York

Croton Dam
1907
Muskegon River, Michigan

Rainbow Dam
1909-1910
Great Falls, Montana

Keokuk - Hamilton Dam
  1910-1913
   Keokuk, Iowa - Hamilton, Illinois
   Hugh L. Cooper
   Chief Engineer

Ryan Dam
1913-1915
Great Falls, Montana

Toronto Power
   1907
   Niagara Falls, Canada
   Hugh L. Cooper
   Chief Engineer

Ocoee Dam #1
1910-1911
Parksville, Tennessee

The damming of rivers to provide the water pressure to turn the turbines and generators also solved three other problems with the rivers. Flood control, river navigation and irrigation which were much needed on many America rivers. See the chart on Purpose for the Dams and Power Plants.

     Comparisons of the dams and power plants starts with the Black Eagle Dam in Great Falls, Montana. The first similarity with the Keokuk-Hamilton Dam is that it was and still is a privately owned facility. This also is true of the other Great Falls Dams, Rainbow and Ryan. Also Black Eagle could not be built until a contract was signed to sell power to Boston and Montana Consolidated Copper and Silver Mining Company, a smelter on the bluff above the powerhouse. Keokuk needed a contract with an electric company in Saint Louis, Missouri, in order to secure financing for their project. The added catch for Keokuk was that the electricity needed to be transported 150 miles, many times farther than ever had been done before.

     The Keokuk-Hamilton Dam is not the highest, but by far it is the longest dam at 4649 feet. If you include the powerhouse, lock, dry-dock and ice fender the entire project was 6665 feet long. The generating capacity is only surpassed by two dams which were much higher thus having a taller head for generating electricity.

     The last comparison is a look at the engineering life of Hugh Lincoln Cooper the genius designer of the Keokuk-Hamilton hydroelectric project. Shown in the list of dams and power plants are five of Hugh Cooper’s projects. These accomplishments gave Cooper many awards including the Civil Engineering Hall of Fame and the Order of the Red Banner of Labour from the Soviet Government. The last award came for his guidance in the building of the Dneproges Dam in Zaporozhye, Ukraine.