Irrigation in the United States : testimony of Elwood Mead, Irrigation Expert in Charge, before the United States Industrial Commission, June 11 and 12, 1901 . ctive and whatland must remain forever arid and almost worthless. IMPORTANCE OF WATER LAWS NOT AT FIRST APPRECIATED. The importance of adequate water laws was not appreciated at theoutset. There were many reasons for this. In the beginning nearlyeveryones attention was given to the overcoming of physical obsta-cles. The Mormons at City Creek, in Ctah, could not wait for thepassage of irrigation laws. They had to divert and use the strea
Irrigation in the United States : testimony of Elwood Mead, Irrigation Expert in Charge, before the United States Industrial Commission, June 11 and 12, 1901 . ctive and whatland must remain forever arid and almost worthless. IMPORTANCE OF WATER LAWS NOT AT FIRST APPRECIATED. The importance of adequate water laws was not appreciated at theoutset. There were many reasons for this. In the beginning nearlyeveryones attention was given to the overcoming of physical obsta-cles. The Mormons at City Creek, in Ctah, could not wait for thepassage of irrigation laws. They had to divert and use the streamto keep from starving to death. The settlers at Greeley, Colo., hadfirst of all to learn how to build and operate ditches. With their set-tlement came the grasshopper plague, and between this and thecontest with breaking ditches, the improvement of fields, and theraising of money to make needed repairs and improvements, it wasnine years before they began to study seriously how they were to pro-tect their right to take water. In California millions of dollars had U S. Dept. of Agr., Bui. 105, Office of Expt Stations. Irrigation Investigations Plate Fig. 2.—Division Gate of the Consolidated Canal Company, Arizona. 11 been invested in canals before the controversy arose over riparianrights. There are other reasons for the delay in providing adequate lawsfor the protection of irrigators rights to water. Many of the Statesinterested in irrigation lie partly within the arid and partly withinthe humid region. In every case the humid portions were first set-tled, and the first inhabitants framed the earlier laws. The impor-tance of irrigation was not realized and no provision made for itsfuture development. In many of the arid States mining and therange-stock industries preceded irrigation, and the men engaged inthese industries, together with the people in the cities, framed theearlier laws. Even among irrigators themselves it was a long timebefore the difference between the
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectirrigat, bookyear1901
