"Excavation has begun for the dam with power shovels operating at various elevations. These shovels will soon be augmented by three 6-yard electric shovels. Each of these shovels is capable of excavating over six tons of material at a scoop." -- California Highways and Public Works (November 1938)

See also "Excavation bucket, Shasta Dam"

https://calisphere.org/item/2ebd80014f846a506c1e8e40d4c6e813/

Written on photograph, K-487-CV Kennett Division. Shasta Dam. Detail of five-yard capacity bucket on Bucyrus-Erie electric shovel of the type used in abutment excavation. B. D. Glaha, Photo. January 25, 1939.

Shasta Dam. R. R. By-pass Tunnel. Electric shovel working in south heading. B. D. Glaha, Photo. January 25, 1939.

http://archives.csuchico.edu/digital/collection/coll27/id/134/

Cool that he brings his boom-box to work. He's probably groovin' to a little Vaughn Monroe and his Orchestra but secretly dreamin' about Dinah Shore.

Is that a Tonka by the Shasta?

Never let your lunchbox get too far away.

Not shovel and probable probably not steam.

In our neck of the woods, every independently-owned dump truck -- and there are thousands, it seems -- is chrome plated, clean as the proverbial whistle, with boutique-y paint jobs and gold filigree accents. Hard to believe they've ever hauled a single bushel of soil.

Ol' grandpa here could stand a makeover. Five or six hours with the pressure washer, a crate of Simoniz and a fifty gallon drum of that shiny-tire stuff -- who's up for that challenge?