The Redridge Steel Dam is a

steel dam A steel dam is a type of dam (a structure to impound or retard the flow of water) that is made of steel, rather than the more common masonry, earthworks, concrete or timber construction materials. Relatively few examples were ever built. Of t ...

across the

Salmon Trout River There are two streams named Salmon Trout River in the Upper Peninsula of the U.S. state of Michigan. Marquette County The Salmon Trout River in the Huron Mountains of Marquette County is home to the "coaster" brook trout. The U.S. Geologic ...

in Redridge,

Houghton County Houghton County is a county in the Upper Peninsula in the U.S. state of Michigan. As of the 2020 Census, the population was 37,361. The county seat and largest city is Houghton. Both the county and the city were named for Michigan State geo ...

Michigan Michigan () is a U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, upper Midwestern United States. With a population of nearly 10.12 million and an area of nearly , Michigan is the List of U.S. states and ...

. Completed in 1901, it is a flat slab buttress dam constructed of steel, a relatively rare material for construction of dams, which are typically made of earthenworks,

concrete Concrete is a composite material composed of fine and coarse aggregate bonded together with a fluid cement (cement paste) that hardens (cures) over time. Concrete is the second-most-used substance in the world after water, and is the most ...

, or

masonry Masonry is the building of structures from individual units, which are often laid in and bound together by mortar; the term ''masonry'' can also refer to the units themselves. The common materials of masonry construction are bricks, building ...

. Most sources indicate that it was one of only three such dams constructed in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., federal district, five ma ...

, the other two being the Ashfork-Bainbridge Steel Dam (1898, Arizona) and the Hauser Lake Dam (1907, Montana), the last of which failed within a year of construction.

History

In 1894, prior to the construction of the steel dam, the

Atlantic Mining Company The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the "Old World" of Africa, Europe and ...

built a timber crib dam across the Salmon Trout River. The dam created a reservoir which supplied water to the Atlantic stamp mill which extracted

copper Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu (from la, cuprum) and atomic number 29. It is a soft, malleable, and ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. A freshly exposed surface of pure copper has a pinkish ...

from ore-bearing rock. With the growth of the Atlantic stamp mill and the construction of the

Baltic Mining Company The Copper Range Company was a major copper-mining company in the Copper Country of Michigan, United States. It began as the Copper Range Company in the late 19th century as a holding company specializing in shares in the copper mines south of Ho ...

mill Mill may refer to: Science and technology * * Mill (grinding) * Milling (machining) * Millwork * Textile manufacturing, Textile mill * Steel mill, a factory for the manufacture of steel * List of types of mill * Mill, the arithmetic unit of the A ...

nearby, this reservoir proved to be insufficient, and in 1901 the steel dam was built. It was designed by J. F. Jackson and built by the

Wisconsin Bridge and Iron Company The Wisconsin Bridge and Iron Company (WB&I) was a fabricator and erector of iron and steel bridges and other large structures. According to one source it was founded in Milwaukee, Wisconsin in 1888. According to another source, the firm was foun ...

. The old timber crib dam remained in place, submerged, upstream of the steel dam. A system of

spillway A spillway is a structure used to provide the controlled release of water downstream from a dam or levee, typically into the riverbed of the dammed river itself. In the United Kingdom, they may be known as overflow channels. Spillways ensure t ...

s, sluices (or ''launders'' as they are referred to in contemporary texts), and pipes brought water downhill to the stamp mills. The dam itself measures 74 ft (23 m) high at its center and extends for a length of 1,006 ft (307 m) across the river. Access to the reservoir was shared by the Atlantic and Baltic mines, which had a common board of directors. The dam operated for several decades, until the mines closed. After that time, the dam was no longer maintained. On Easter morning of 1941, the spillway behind the dam broke, causing a flood. There was little damage to the steel part of the dam, but with the mining operations stopped, the dam owners had the spillway valves opened. However, there were still incidents of overtopping, and the Copper Range Company (successor to Atlantic Mine Company and owner of the dam) had large holes cut in it in 1979 so that it would not retain water. This lowered the level of the reservoir, revealing the earlier timber dam. Ownership of the dam was transferred to Stanton Township in 1992. Fears that the timber dam might fail and Michigan's Department of Environmental Quality considering the dam a "significant hazard" forced the township to consider renovating the dam in 2001. Five options were proposed for a long-term fix for the dam. These options ranged from repairing the steel and wooden dams for $311,000 to restoring/ reconstructing the entire structure for over a million dollars. Stanton Township could not afford to do any of the proposed options, so another option was sought out. A short-term fix was found to make the dam safer. The upper 13 feet of the wooden structure was removed in 2004 to bring the water level down and relieve some of the pressure. A more permanent repair is still needed. A recent study by a team of students from

Michigan Technological University Michigan Technological University (Michigan Tech, MTU, or simply Tech) is a public research university in Houghton, Michigan, founded in 1885 as the Michigan Mining School, the first post-secondary institution in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. ...

determined that both dams are likely to remain safe for the foreseeable future. RedridgeSteelDam01

Construction information

Steel dam A steel dam is a type of dam (a structure to impound or retard the flow of water) that is made of steel, rather than the more common masonry, earthworks, concrete or timber construction materials. Relatively few examples were ever built. Of t ...

s use relatively thin steel plates in contact with the water body, with a framework of steel behind them transmitting the load to the ground. The plates are slanted upwards in the direction of water flow, so that the weight of the water puts compressive forces on the girders holding the plates up. This transmits force to the ground without the bending moment that a vertical wall of plates would engender. It was believed at the time that these dams could be constructed faster and more cheaply than masonry dams.

Geography and site information

Redridge is in Houghton County, one of the more rugged counties in Michigan, and access to the dam site is relatively challenging, although there is a history of

students making pilgrimages to the site, especially those interested in

industrial archaeology Industrial archaeology (IA) is the systematic study of material evidence associated with the industrial past. This evidence, collectively referred to as industrial heritage, includes buildings, machinery, artifacts, sites, infrastructure, doc ...

Historic designations

National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artist ...

, listed April 2, 1992 *Michigan Historic Civil Engineering Landmark, designated in 1985This imag
(The Redridge ASCE Plaque)
of a plaque on the site shows the date of designation

Notes

External links

Redridge
site map, the steel dam is marked "new dam" * *

Historic American Engineering Record Heritage Documentation Programs (HDP) is a division of the U.S. National Park Service (NPS) responsible for administering the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS), Historic American Engineering Record (HAER), and Historic American Landscapes ...

(HAER) documentation: ** **
A Brief History of Steel Dams by Hubert Chanson
at Copper Range Historical Society site

by Robert Goniea
Dam Ruins
- an exploration of the Redridge Dams as they appear today