Ruralite Cafe: Published 09/27/01

By Lynn Hotaling - Associate Editor

Hitler's blitz led to local engineering marvel

And one of those fascinating tales is the history of a local engineering marvel - a network of tunnels and steel pipe that channels the Tuckaseigee River's west fork through the mountains - completed in just 16 months 60 years ago.

With World War II already raging in Europe, crews in Jackson County worked around the clock to build a massive hydroelectric project aimed at providing power for an aluminum plant in Tennessee.

When the Aluminum Company of America began construction of the Glenville (now Thorpe) dam, lake and powerhouse, it did so in order to step up the output at its plant in Alcoa, Tenn. - capacity that was needed to produce airplanes for the Allied war effort.

"When Thorpe came on line, we were producing enough power to make aluminum for two B-25 bombers per day," said Charlie Stewart, Thorpe superintendent for some 35 years.

The story of that big steel pipe supported by tall towers that we see from N.C. 107 while traveling to and from Glenville is nothing short of amazing.

Impounded by a 150-foot-high dam, water from the 4.5-mile-long lake travels through 3 miles of tunnels and steel pipe and drops a total of 1,207 feet before reaching the powerhouse in Tuckasegee. This gives Thorpe the highest head (vertical drop) of any power plant east of the Rocky Mountains.

The three 9-foot-diameter tunnels total 4,803 linear feet and were drilled through solid rock with crews working from each end of each tunnel.

"That meant the job went three times faster than if they'd drilled one long tunnel," Stewart said. While drilling proceeded on the tunnels, other crews were hard at work building the dam and powerhouse, he said.

Engineers checked the tunnels daily to make sure the crews working from each portal of the tunnel stayed on course.

"They'd run lines up over the mountains and down and follow the drillers through to keep them on line," Stewart said. "When the tunnels were drilled through, they were always right on target, give or take a few inches. It was a big event when the two ends would meet."

Construction began in June 1940, and despite the effects of the county's greatest natural disaster - the August 1940 flood - the plant began producing electricity on Oct. 13, 1941.

Two weeks shy of the plant's 60th birthday and in the midst of this county's celebration of its 150th anniversary, Thorpe's story seems significant. In the wake of Sept. 11's terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon, I remembered Stewart telling me of the fear of German sabotage while the plant was under construction.

Army troops patrolled the area, he said, and guards were placed at the tunnel entrances.

"They never actually caught anyone around here, but they did catch some German saboteurs in a small submarine off the North Carolina coast," Stewart said. "It was thought at the time that their target might have been Alcoa - either the aluminum plant or the power plants."

It was a decade ago when he told me about the guards and apprehension that surrounded Thorpe's construction back in 1940, and I must admit it seemed a little far-fetched. It was hard to imagine foreign nationals on American soil - plotting destruction.

After the tragedies in New York City and Washington, D.C., though, I think I understand.

And that insight has led me to see the lesson Thorpe's construction teaches us about American ingenuity and perseverance: We find a way to accomplish our goals, and we know how to make ends meet.

Back to Archive: 09/27/01.