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Harold A. Rands (1871-1952) was a civil engineer. He superintended hydroelectric installations for various firms, including Portland Electric Power Co., Washington Water Power Co., and North Coast Power Co. From 1929-1935 he was in charge of power and flood control surveys on the Columbia River and tributaries for the U.S. Corp of Engineers. He also served as senior engineer for the construction of the Bonneville Dam and powerhouse complex.
The collection contains field diaries, correspondence, reports, project files including Columbia River and Bonneville dam projects, photographs, and a few personal files.
Rands' field diaries span his career from 1906-1941 with few lapses. Personal files that include correspondence, photographs, writings and notes are filed after the diaries.
Project files (1913-1925) are titled by project and arranged in rough chronological order. In addition to smaller projects Rands' worked on such as the Hammon Consolidated Gold Fields in Alaska, there is a large section of correspondence, reports and notes on Portland Electric Power Company's "Oak Grove Project." This project involved the construction of a system of dams and powerhouses on the Clackamas and Oak Grove rivers to supply power for Portland. The Oak Grove files include five volumes of progress reports with photographs, preliminary siting reports and a file of forecasted future power costs (1924).
Willamette River Survey files (1935-1937) contain construction cost information, flood control, irrigation, reservoir sites, and reservoir sites, railroad, and highway revisions. An organizational chart is filed at the beginning of box 13 that provides name identification for the correspondence folders which immediately follow.
The Columbia River and Tributaries Survey files (1932-1935) comprise materials on Bonneville dam construction including specifications for dam construction, powerhouse and locks, relocation of the railroad, a survey of grout and drainage pipe installation, preliminary traffic surveys of the river, background notes and computations, and surveys of tributary rivers such as the Deschutes and the Snake.