rock fitl dam in australia and the southern hemisphere hoover dam a joint venture com pleted a year ahead of schedule has been called the most mon umental dam-building effort in america's history the project's total partnership profits were 10,400,000 — a significant figure in those days yet an amount which is substantially less than utah in ternational's average monthly earn ings during 1976 the magnitude of the endeavor posed an awesome challenge to the resources and skills of the six companies inc of which utah construction company was a founder and major partici pant and tested their ability to adapt their experience to a wide range of requirements shortly before and immediately following world war ii utah con struction company further diversi fied and applied the broad experi ence gained through the building of railroads dams bridges tunnels aqueducts and power plants to the growing demands for heavy indus trial facilities military installations waterfront facilities and private housing it was during this period that utah's construction projects in australia canada mexico peru colombia indonesia guam korea and the philippines introduced utah to locations and experiences out side the u.s establishing the foun dation of the international activity in which utah participates today it was also during the postwar period that utah utilized its earth moving skills to enter the mining field with contract surface coal mining operations in western penn sylvania and an owned iron ore mine near cedar city utah in 1953 utah made its boldest move into mining to that date when it established in peru what was to become a major open-pit iron ore mine serving the steel industries in the united states europe and ja pan in the years prior to its 1975 expropriation by the peruvian gov ern ment the marcona mine had produced a total of approximately 137 million tons of beneficiated iron ore including approximately 39 million tons of iron ore pellets the venture displayed utah's ability to recognize and make the most of opportunities although the exis tence of an iron ore deposit in the desolate coastal region 250 miles south of lima was well known utah was the first private development an aerial view ol hoover dam ows the magnitude of an opera tion which required 5,000 workers and over 54.8 million in capital costs more than 50 tunnels and shafts were required in the prelim inary work and actual construction of the dam which was built on a portion of the colorado river that intersects arizona and nevada