The second round of MSNBC’s "Lean Forward" campaign launches on Monday with a surprise for Nevada residents. One of the advertisements directed by Spike Lee and starring Rachel Maddow is set in front of Hoover Dam.

Maddow is an American television host and political commentator for MSNBC. Maddow, who splits her time living in Manhattan and western Massachusetts, told Jimmy Fallon that she "completely conned them into letting me do my commercial at the Hoover Dam — Spike Lee shooting a commercial with me in it at the Hoover Dam. I can die happy. It’s so cool.”

Maddow said that she was first taken by Hoover Dam when she took a side trip after attending the opening of her girlfriend's art gallery. While there is a political message attached to the commercial (Hoover Dam was a Great Depression project), it is also apparent that Maddow was struck by the sheer size and grandeur of the project.

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The project was dedicated on September 30, 1935, by President Franklin Roosevelt. However, it was actually the result of an appropriation by Congress in 1928 before the Great Depression. (The project had been on the drawing boards since 1922.) Construction started in 1931 because it took time to award the bid. Ironically, the private firm in charge of the project completed the job two years ahead of schedule. It made a profit and also came in under budget.

What was so remarkable is that such a large-scale project had never been built before and many of the techniques were unproven. In addition to the engineering challenges that construction workers would face, the lack of facilities and harsh summer weather was challenging.

To help entice workers to the site rather than solve transportation issues to and from Las Vegas, the Bureau of Reclamation and Six Companies, Inc. (the company awarded the bid to build Hoover Dam) also built Boulder City, Nevada. Its sole purpose was originally to provide housing for as many as 5,000 residents and their families working on the project.

"One somewhat surprising fact about Boulder City is that gambling was illegal," says James Hoke, president of TourGuy.com. "Today, it remains only one of two towns in Nevada that do not have legalized gaming. Alcohol was also prohibited in the town until 1969."

The city remained a government-owned town until 1959, when it was incorporated. While it would legalize alcohol ten years after the charter, it never legalized gaming. Recently, Money magazine ranked Boulder City sixth in its annual list of the top 25 places to retire in the United States.

"Really, especially with the completion of the Arch Bridge, there are two engineering marvels to see," said Hoke. "There are two amazing ways to see Hoover Dam. Either by taking a ground tour to the dam or by choosing a number of flyovers that include trips over the Grand Canyon."

Hoke said although Maddow might have missed that the dam was the result of economic prosperity before the Great Depression, the engineering feat did become a symbol of hope during those years. It does everything she says it does, Hoke said. Hoover Dam gives you a perspective of something greater than yourself.

Watch for the Maddow ads that began running this week on MSNBC and on msnbc.com and in cinemas across the country during the peak summer movie season and in cross-channel platforms across NBC Universal. Separate print and digital ads will also run in major publications. Hoke said he is thrilled that Hoover Dam will be receiving more exposure for the engineering marvel that it is.

For more information about Hoover Dam tours or other travel adventures in Nevada, Arizona, California, and Utah, visit TourGuy.com.