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Friant Dam pictured here was classified as ready for service in November 1944. In July 1945 Peter Kiewit & Sons Company of Omaha, Nebraska was awarded the contract to build the Friant-Kern Canal. The Friant-Kern Canal outlet works are located on the…

Annotation on the back of the photo tells how the Friant Dam will sit "right in the V" where the earth has been removed. During construction of the Dam, powder charges helped remove over 1.2 million cubic yards of loose material during foundation…

The first concrete was poured at Friant Dam on July 29, 1940. Four small, diesel-electric cars ran on two tracks each transporting 4-cubic-yard buckets. The cars were lifted from the track by two 30-ton gantry cranes and lowered on to the forms.…

The sign in the background identifies the buildings in the distance as "Camp Friant". This camp town opened in January 1938 on a fifty-acre parcel near the town of Friant. The camp consisted of 50 houses, an office building, and two 48-man…

Millerton Lake is the reservoir created by Friant Dam. The lake first stored water on February 21, 1944 and continues to provide water storage, flood control, and recreation. It can hold 520,528 acre-feet of water, has a surface area of 4,900 acres…

This point has been known by various names since miners first visited in the 1850s. It has been called Converse Ferry, Jones Ferry, Hamptonville, and with the arrival of the railroad was rechristened "Pollasky". The name came from Marcus Pollasky,…

Unidentified test cores created during the construction of Friant Dam.

The San Joaquin River Basin encompasses nearly 15,000 square miles. The river's headwaters begin life as snow on the peaks of the Sierra Nevada Mountains seen in the background. Most of the Sierra's annual average 80 to 90 inches of snowpack…

With two American flags flying from its top rim and with the sign seen in this picture the bucket delivered the first load of concrete to Friant Dam at 2 O'clock in the afternoon of Monday, July 29, 1940. The ceremony was arranged by the Central…

Street scene in Friant, California, probably around 1940. The Log Cabin, probably a restaurant, is seen in the middle.