High on a Lonely Hill

High on a Lonely Hill. The onset of World War II led to tightened security.. , Hoover Dam was considered critical to the war effort because of the electricity it generated and the water stored in Lake Mead., America’s enemies knew how significant the dam was, too. As early as 1939, a plot to bomb the intake towers by foreign agents living in Las Vegas was uncovered and prevented. A few more minor incidents occurred during the war, but the dam was never seriously threatened., [Captions:], The pillbox on the hill above you was one of four camouflaged fortifications that were armed with machine guns and manned around the clock., Under construction in December 1941., Three of the original four pillboxes were dismantled. The remaining structure was stabilized and rehabilitated by the Bureau of Reclamation and the National Park Service in 2012., Gordon B. Kaufmann, who created the dam’s architectural design (above), suggested stringing steel cables and armor plating across Black Canyon to protect the dam from bombs. Allen Tupper True, designer of the dam’s floor inlays, proposed camouflaging the dam and building a “decoy dam” downstream. Neither idea was implemented., After the December 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor, no private vehicles were allowed across the top of the dam without a military escort for the duration of the war. , The City of Henderson grew up around the Basic Magnesium Plant that used one-quarter of the electricity generated at Hoover Dam during World War II. Magnesium was used to build airplanes and incendiary devices.