THE INVISIBLE LINK

Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] [Applause] [Music] Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. [Music] I like Sam. Building dorms is hard work. It's hard and dangerous, but it's my job. I am the foreman of a cement crew on the Capunda up in the mountains about 90 km north of Sidsburg. It's going to be the biggest hydroelectric development in Austria when we get it finished. It's a backbreaking nerve tearing job. It takes a tough man to handle those vibrating machines we use. They are to shake the cement down inside and harden it. It's a rush job, so we work 11our shifts, 4 weeks at a stretch. We get special pay for our long hours. Of course. When we get our three days off every fourth week, we don't lose any time getting away. Most of us have got families down in the valley. This dam we're working on, it's a pretty important project. One of the big things the Marshall Plan people are doing to help Austria back on its feet is putting our mountain streams to work making electricity. Water power is among the few natural assets we've got plenty of. That's why we're pushing right ahead on Capun with a thousand men on the payroll. Heat. Heat. [Music] So far, Capun's only party finished. But already it's supplying some power. And when it's done and all the other 19 dams are done that the Marshall Plan is making possible, it's going to mean a big difference to us [Music] Austrians. One thing it's going to do is give our heavy industries a chance to grow. The more we can increase our production, aluminum for instance, and steel, the less we're going to have to import, that means we'll be able to save our dollars for other things we have to get abroad. It means that more of our people will be able to get jobs, and there will be more pay envelopes to go around. How to find employment for our population is one of Austria's big problems these days. Heat. Heat. [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] Then there are all the other uses we've got for electric power. Our cities and towns would just about have to close down without it. We use it here more than in most countries because we can't spare the money to import fuel, especially when there is all that water power in our mountains. In Austria, the chances are you will travel by electric power just about any way you pick to get around. The only countries in Europe that have got so large a share of their railway mileage electrified are Sweden and Switzerland. But parts of Austria are still miles from the nearest railroad line. And with new hydroelectric power on the way, there's going to be service for lots of people who never had it before. Railroad service, though, is just about the least of what electricity is doing for the country people around Austria. The great thing is electrified farms. With all these machines making it so the farmers can get their work done better and faster and easier. Already a good percentage of the farms in Austria are electrified and the rest are waiting. Take my wife's people in their place up in the mountains just above our town. Practically the whole thing runs by electric power. They got an electric pump to spray the liquid fertilizer. And they got just about everything. [Music] But when electricity really makes a difference to the farmers, it's plowing time. A winch for cable plowing was the first thing those people bought when electricity reached their farm. It's a simple setup. From the winch, a cable runs up and through a kind of pulley at the top of the field and back down to the [Music] plow. All they have to do is take in the cable on the winch and up goes a plow. Easy as on level ground. If you want to know how much that means to a mountain farmer, just go to some part of Austria where electricity hasn't reached yet and watch how the whole family, women and men, young and old, have to work. So little of Austria's flood, we just have to cultivate the mountain slopes. And on grades that steep, horses and tractors are no good. There are plenty of districts where plowing still has to be done this way because there's not yet enough electric power. But the people know one thing. It's coming. Just down the mountain, they can see the poles going up, getting closer and [Music] closer. Pretty soon our dam will be finished. And then another and another stirring up more power. It's been a long time building Capron has, but we're getting it done. And has all the others underway. Heat up here. [Applause] All over Austria. Someday there will be new dams turning out electric power for the highest and farthest farms and for big new industries. A little country like this, we have to make the most of what we got. And with American help, we are doing it. Heat. Heat.