Jerry Borrowman > Quotes

“I’m the guy who builds things. So when this dam is done, it will have Pete Conroy’s name written on it somewhere. Even if nobody else in the world ever finds that place, it doesn’t matter because I’ll know that it was me and my men who did the job. Just as important, my men always come first. I get a lot more work out of men by treating them like decent human beings. I don’t treat them like slaves, as some of the foremen do.”
― Jerry Borrowman, Life and Death at Hoover Dam

“The question: where to build such a dam? An initial survey selected a site in an area known as Boulder Canyon, south of Las Vegas. Twenty-five years later, at the outset of the Great Depression, the proposed dam became a possibility with congressional authorization of the “Boulder Canyon Project.” A more detailed analysis showed that Black Canyon, a few miles downstream from Boulder Canyon, had more stable bedrock to support the estimated 7 million tons of concrete that was to be the single largest structure in human history.”
― Jerry Borrowman, Life and Death at Hoover Dam

“The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider or some other loathsome creature over the fire . . . you hang by a slender thread . . . yet it is nothing but his hand that holds you from falling into the fire every moment.”
― Jerry Borrowman, Life and Death at Hoover Dam

“That’s the way a prejudice works; you come to despise the people you’ve taken advantage of so your conscience doesn’t hurt.”
― Jerry Borrowman, Life and Death at Hoover Dam