LEWISTON—An estimated 11,000 people helped build the Niagara Power Project, which was dedicated Feb. 10, 1961 — 50 years ago today.

Many of their stories of this dynamic era will be retold at a workers reunion planned Aug. 13 at the Power Vista, the project's visitor center.

Some of the most compelling stories will be about the 20 workers who died in accidents during the construction.

By comparison, 112 men died during construction of the Hoover Dam, once known as Boulder Dam, in the early 1930s on the Colorado River.

One of the luckier workers at Niagara was the late William J. Glennon, a carpenter who would have been killed by a falling crescent wrench if the tool had not bounced off his protective hard hat.