William Smith Otis was an American inventor of the steam shovel. Otis received a patent for his creation on February 24, 1839.
The Panama Canal Railway is a railway line linking the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean in Central America. The route stretches 47.6 miles (76.6 km) across the Isthmus of Panama from Colón (Atlantic) to Balboa. Because of the difficult physical conditions of the route and state of technology, the construction was renowned as an international engineering achievement, one that cost US$8 million and the lives of an estimated 5,000 to 10,000 workers. Opened in 1855, the railway preceded the Panama Canal by half a century; the railway was vital in assisting the construction of the canal in the early 1900s. With the opening of the canal, the railroad's route was changed as a result of the creation of Gatun Lake, which flooded part of the original route. Following World War II, the railroad's importance declined and much of it fell into a state of neglect until 1998, when a project to rebuild the railroad to haul intermodal traffic began; the new railroad opened in 2001.
Heavy equipment or heavy machinery or Earthmover refers to heavy-duty vehicles specially designed to execute construction tasks, most frequently involving earthwork operations or other large construction tasks. Heavy equipment usually comprises five equipment systems: the implement, traction, structure, power train, and control/information.
A dragline excavator is a piece of heavy equipment used in civil engineering and surface mining.
The Burden Iron Works was an iron works and industrial complex on the Hudson River and Wynantskill Creek in Troy, New York. It once housed the Burden Water Wheel, the most powerful vertical water wheel in history. It is widely believed that George Washington Gale Ferris Jr., inventor of the Ferris wheel, had occasion to observe the wheel while a student at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. The iron works site was listed on the National Register of Historic Places as an archaeological site in 1977. The Burden Ironworks Office Building was previously listed in 1972.
A steam shovel is a large steam-powered excavating machine designed for lifting and moving material such as rock and soil. It is the earliest type of power shovel or excavator. Steam shovels played a major role in public works in the 19th and early 20th century, being key to the construction of railroads and the Panama Canal. The development of simpler, cheaper diesel-powered shovels caused steam shovels to fall out of favor in the 1930s.
Edward Huber was an American inventor and industrialist.
Yule Marble is a marble of metamorphosed Leadville Limestone found only in the Yule Creek Valley, in the West Elk Mountains of Colorado, 2.8 miles (4.5 km) southeast of the town of Marble, Colorado. First discovered in 1873, it is quarried underground at an elevation of 9,300 feet (2,800 m) above sea level—in contrast to most marble, which is quarried from an open pit and at much lower elevations.
The Culebra Cut, formerly called Gaillard Cut, is an artificial valley that cuts through the Continental Divide in Panama. The cut forms part of the Panama Canal, linking Gatun Lake, and thereby the Atlantic Ocean, to the Gulf of Panama and hence the Pacific Ocean. It is 7.8 miles (12.6 km) from the Pedro Miguel lock on the Pacific side to the Chagres River arm of Lake Gatun, with a water level 85 feet (26 m) above sea level.
The Silver Spade was a giant power shovel used for strip mining in southeastern Ohio. Manufactured by Bucyrus-Erie, South Milwaukee, Wisconsin, the model 1950-B was one of two of this model built, the other being the GEM of Egypt. Its sole function was to remove the earth and rock overburden from the coal seam. Attempts to purchase and preserve the shovel from Consol to make it the centerpiece of a mining museum exhibit for $2.6 million fell short, and the shovel was dismantled in February 2007.
Marion Power Shovel Company was an American firm that designed, manufactured and sold steam shovels, power shovels, blast hole drills, excavators, and dragline excavators for use in the construction and mining industries. The company was a major supplier of steam shovels for the construction of the Panama Canal. The company also built the two crawler-transporters used by NASA for transporting the Saturn V rocket and later the Space Shuttle to their launch pads. The company's shovels played a major role in excavation for Hoover Dam, the Holland Tunnel and the extension of the Number 7 subway line to Main Street in Flushing, Queens.
Bucyrus-Erie was an American surface and underground mining equipment company. It was founded as Bucyrus Foundry and Manufacturing Company in Bucyrus, Ohio, in 1880. Bucyrus moved its headquarters to South Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1893. In 1927, Bucyrus merged with the Erie Steam Shovel Company to form Bucyrus-Erie.
Lidgerwood was a historic American engineering company famous for its boilers, winches, scrapers, hoists and cranes, particularly ones that helped build the Panama Canal. They later built logging yarders and aerial tramways, cable cars or ropeways.
A power shovel is a bucket-equipped machine, usually electrically powered, used for digging and loading earth or fragmented rock and for mineral extraction. Power shovels are a type of rope/cable excavator, where the digging arm is controlled and powered by winches and steel ropes, rather than hydraulics like in the more common hydraulic excavators. Basic parts of a power shovel include the track system, cabin, cables, rack, stick, boom foot-pin, saddle block, boom, boom point sheaves and bucket. The size of bucket varies from 0.73 to 53 cubic meters.
Graniterock is an American corporation, founded in 1900 as "Granite Rock", and based in Watsonville, California. It operates in the construction industry providing crushed gravel, sand, concrete, asphalt and paving services.
Incorporated on April 17, 1886, at Marblehead, Ohio, the Lakeside and Marblehead Railroad (L&M) was a short standard gauge railroad that spanned about seven miles (11.3 km) in length. It extended from Marblehead through Lakeside to a connection with the Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railway at Danbury. A common carrier, it carried both freight and passengers. It was abandoned as a common carrier railroad July 31, 1964, operated for the last time as a private industrial railroad in Summer 1978, and its tracks were removed in Fall 1997.
The Ames Monument is a large pyramid in Albany County, Wyoming, designed by Henry Hobson Richardson and dedicated to brothers Oakes Ames and Oliver Ames, Jr., Union Pacific Railroad financiers. It marked the highest point on the first transcontinental railroad, at 8,247 feet (2,514 m).
The Michigan Limestone and Chemical Company operated the world's largest limestone quarry, which is located near Rogers City in Presque Isle County, Michigan. It was formed and organized in 1910; however, production did not begin until 1912. Ownership of the quarry has changed a number of times, but it is still one of the largest producers of limestone in the United States. The quarry was inextricably interlinked with lake shipping and railroad transportation.
Flagg Coal Company 75 is a 0-4-0 saddletank steam locomotive built for the Flagg Coal Company in 1930. Restored and owned by John and Byron Gramling, the engine was loaned in 2002 to the Steam Railroading Institute in Owosso, Michigan where it is used for demonstrations and for powering train rides and excursions. Originally numbered Flagg Coal Company 2, the locomotive's number was changed to 75 when it was sold to the Solvay Process Quarry in 1935. It never actually wore "Flagg Coal Company 75" during its service life.
