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Arthur Powell Davis (1861-1933), nephew of John Wesley Powell, was one of the foremost hydraulic engineers in the world in the early twentieth century. Davis was one of a growing group of government professionals associated with the conservation movement that arose in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries who were proponents of public service through professionalization that utilized scientific accuracy and precision.

Davis was born and raised in Indiana. He graduated from George Washington University in 1882 and received his first job as a typographer with the United States Geological Survey. In 1894 he left the U.S.G.S. and was the Hydrographer in Charge of Stream Measurements until 1897. From 1897 to 1901 he was the Hydrographer in Charge of Examination of Hydrologic Work for Interoceanic Canals in Nicaragua and Panama. In 1902 Davis joined the newly created Reclamation Service as Assistant Chief Engineer. In 1907 he became Chief Engineer and in 1914 became Chief engineer and Director of the Reclamation Service.

After the reorganization of the Reclamation Service into the Bureau of Reclamation in 1923 Davis worked for the East Bay Municipal District in California. In 1929 he left the country for the Soviet Union where he was Chief Consultant for Irrigation in Turkestan and Transcaucasia.

He returned to the United States in 1931 and was named a Consulting Engineer for the Boulder (later renamed Hoover) Dam project in 1933. He died shortly thereafter.

Davis was involved with the Colorado River Compact during the 1920s, the All-American Canal and Imperial Valley, and has been called the father of Hoover Dam.

Davis was named Doctor of Sciences from George Washingtion University in 1917, and Doctor of Engineering from Iowa State College in 1920. He married Elizabeth Brown in 1888 and they had four daughters. Elizabeth died in 1917 and he later married Marie MacNaughton.