USA > California > California gold book : first nugget, its discovery and discoverers, and some of the results proceeding therefrom > Part 16
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Irrigation has worked wonders for Fresno. Its average atmosphere was hot and dry, with occasional blistering winds in the summer time which were des- tructive to vegetation, and nearly so to life. These hot, dry seasons were exactly what was wanted for curing raisins most economically if the raisin grape could be produced, and a supply of water has solved that problem. The volume of water in Kings and San Joaquin rivers aggregated enough to thoroughly irri- gate every arable acre in Fresno county, and with canals and ditches its application to the lands where and when needed was found practicable.
Then came the inauguration of the colony system. That was the wisest move made, and has added several thousand industrious and prosperous citizens to Fresno's population. There are still several hundred thousand acres to be subdivided, but the work will go on until the last large ranch has been swallowed up by numbers of small, well tilled vineyards and orchards.
ENYO COUNTY was organized in 1865, with Inde- pendence as the county seat. It is a region of won- derful contrasts, of Arctic cold, and a heat that would paralyze almost anything that lives; of valleys of great fertility, and a sink so sterile that it has gained the title of Death's valley ; of high mountains and a mysterious depression hundreds of feet below the level of the sea.
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There are mines of gold, silver and lead being worked in Inyo, but they are not yielding large amounts. No one can safely predict what exploration may dis- cover in the mountains surrounding Death's valley. There are three important industries which have been sufficiently developed to fix their immense value. The Inyo Development Company is manufacturing several thousand tons of soda annually by evaporating the water from Owen's lake. This is worth $33 per ton. The Saline Valley Borax Company produces fifty tons of borax monthly, worth $145 per ton. The supply is inexhaustible. The Inyo Marble Company is producing a marble which has no equal anywhere. A few samples would convince anyone with an eye to beauty in blend- ing of colors of the futility of any artist trying to rival the Great Master in delicate and chaste work. The quarries turn out pure white, and every color that was ever seen on canvas or in nature. Great slabs can be obtained without speck or flaw, and it is so strong that it can be sawed into sheets as thin as pasteboard, and vases turned from it no thicker than fine porcelain.
Besides these mines of wealth which are being intro- duced to the attention of people on the coast and in the east, there are half a million acres of land in Owen's valley equal to the best in the State for the production of every kind of semitropic fruit. Inyo is not to be despised. Water can be turned into her fertile valleys and then she will take her place among the most pros- perous communities in the State.
ULARE COUNTY was organized in 1854, from territory taken from Mariposa and the county seat established at Visalia. It is the sixth county in
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size in the State. Her great fertile valleys are among the largest in this State of great things, and her mount- ains, which include Mount Whitney, rank among the highest in America. Her wheat fields are great ; her irrigation canals are great ; her herds of sheep and cattle are great ; her products of fruits and vines are great, her lumbering interests are great, and she is great in everything but evidences of poverty and want.
The first settlement by the whites in the county is credited to Campbell, Pool & Co., who opened a ferry on King's river in the spring of 1852. Later in the same year N. Vice, a Texan bear-hunter, and one O'Neil, came to the present site of Visalia and laid out the town, which was named for Vice. There were hardly any but Indian inhabitants in the valleys and hills when Vice and his partner came. They must have done some advertising, for in less than a month there were sixty white inhabitants in the young town. The immense advantages of the county were made known and population poured in. Prosperous ranches were started everywhere in the hills. Other towns grew in various localities almost as fast as Visalia. Tulare never furnished any mining excitement to the State. It was her wonderful fertility that made her populous, and subsequently made her the largest grain- producing county in California, the land of immensity. The county contains 6,406 square miles of surface, or about 4,099,440 acres. Of this at least 2,000,000 acres are cultivable. There are about 20,000 acres of tule lands bordering upon Tulare lake. The balance of the land is mountainous. The foothill lands are of great value, as it is upon them that the citrus fruits thrive to the best advantage. The Sierra Nevada
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mountains in Tulare average 10,000 to 12,000 feet in height. Lofty peaks and tremendously deep gorges make the mountains extremely rugged. Whitney, which overtops the rest, is 15,056 feet high. Researches of later years have developed minerals in great variety in Tulare. Some gold deposits exist up in the Kaweah region, but the approaches are so nearly inaccessible that the deposits are of little value. Other metals and minerals also exist, chief among which are iron, lead, copper, antimony, coal and fine marble.
The wonders accomplished in agriculture have con- tributed more than anything else to bring Tulare into prominence. The region north of Tulare lake probably shows the greatest development in large irrigation enterprises. A branch of Kaweah river, called Cross creek, furnishes a tremendous lot of water for this region, named Lucerne vale. Altogether there are seven canals in that portion, summing up 265 miles in length, and with an aggregate capacity of 1,300 cubic feet of water per second. Other irrigation districts, embracing thousands of acres, are established all over the county, and there is an abundance of water for them all. A large number of farms are irrigated by artesian wells. The first well was bored by the rail- road company in 1870, at Tipton. They struck a good flow at 310 feet, and used the water to irrigate forty acres of trees. Some of the later wells are capable of irrigating several hundred acres. A few years ago the grain of hundreds of thousands of acres required greater facility of manipulation. It was a Tulare farmer who first applied steam contrivances successfully to grain fields. By his method the ground is plowed, harrowed and seeded by steam. Machines are kept
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going night and day. About ninety acres is a good day's work. In harvesting, a steam traction engine runs the combined harvester and thresher over the fields, reaping easily 100 acres in a day, and depositing the sacked grain in its path. The winterless climate of Tulare long ago marked it as being simply perfection for stock-raising. Cattle, horses, sheep and hogs mul- tiply rapidly there under the best conditions, and the herds are now very large.
Year by year the doubters as to the benefits to be derived from the use of surface water on any crop that it will pay to plant, are becoming converted to the belief that irrigation is a greater discovery than gold. The little streams of water not only wet the soil, but they carry to the millions of rootlets exactly the elements they require to produce a vigorous growth and an abundant fruitage. Tulareans are observant, and a fact as prominent as this has become apparent on every character of soil, and for every kind of fruit, vine and cereal, has converted them to water users- confirmed irrigationists. This being the case, many hundreds of miles of new canals and distributing ditches were built during the year 1892, and tens of thousands of acres of land hitherto dry have been brought under irrigation. Among other ventures of the kind that of the Tulare irrigation district stands foremost. A new system of works, whereby 50,000 acres will be supplied with water, has been completed at a cost of $500,000, and it will result in more than doubling the ordinary product of those acres the coming year. Other enterprises of the kind are under way, notably at Tipton and on Lower Tule river. Alta district, in the northern portion of the county, has
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added largely to its already extensive area of irrigated land, and Kern and Tulare districts, at the southern extremity of the county, seem to be getting into shape to commence another large system of works at an early day. Many, and in fact most all private and corporate irrigation systems in the county, have also been enlarged and extended.
Tulare presents a peculiar chapter to the wonders of the State, wherein may be read a story of past ages in her great Tulare lake. This name was given to the body of water by early explorers from the Catholic mission and the subsequent hunters and trappers. Tu- lare signifies tules, and the county and city of Tulare were both named for the lake. This lake was for- merly about thirty miles long, and covered one hundred square miles of surface. It has no outlet, the waters of the Tulare, King's and Kaweah rivers, with those of small streams, sinking and evaporating. In recent years much of this supply of water has been diverted for irrigation purposes. One canal alone, called the " 76," takes away a stream one hundred feet wide and four feet deep. Evaporation has done much to reduce the size of the lake, and recently a small forest of trees, broken off and strewn about, were discovered on the lake's bottom. None of these are uprooted, but stand as stumps and snags in the shallow water which has protected them from decay. The variety seems to be willow, grown sometimes two feet thick, and doubt- less of great age. The trees were probably about their present size when the water submerged them, as they would not live under a very considerable depth. Evi- dently Tulare Lake is not a body of water of very ancient origin. Fish have always been abundant in its
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waters, perch and catfish being most plentiful. The lake is now very much smaller than formerly, and as the rivers that feed it are being turned into irrigation districts, it will be no long period before the rich body of land it covers will be in use for cultivation unless it is fed by a considerable number of springs at its bottom.
Tulare county has room for ten times her present population, and gladly welcomes immigration. Prices for lands rule much lower here than in the older sections of the State, where results of culture are better known.
AN LUIS OBISPO COUNTY is one of the twenty-seven sub-divisions of the State made prior to its admission into the Union. It derived its name from the mission founded one hundred and twenty years ago in honor of the memory of Saint Luis, the Bishop of Toulouse. The history of the county is inti- mately bound up with that of the various mission establishments in California.
On June 3, 1770, was founded the mission and presidio of San Carlos Borromeo de Monterey. In accordance with previous orders Portola, as soon as a beginning was fairly made at Monterey, turned the government of the new establishments over to the padres, and sailed away in the San Antonio on the 9th of July. During the year 1770 little was done at Monterey owing to a lack of priests and soldiers. The eestablishment of the mission San Buenaventura had to be postponed on this account. In May, 1771, the San Antonio again anchored in the bay of Monterey,
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having on board ten priests with all the necessary appurtenances for the establishment of the five new missions proposed, namely : San Buenaventura, San Gabriel, San Luis Obispo, San Antonio, Santa Clara and San Francisco. Domingo Juncosa and Jose Cavaller were appointed to superintend the founding of the San Luis Obispo mission. The natives became hostile about this time and the work of the mission- aries was deterred for awhile. In the ratter part of September re-enforcements arrived. In consequence of the recent outbreak six soldiers were added to the guard at San Gabriel, and the founding of a new mission was postponed. The next year the San Antonio brought orders to explore the bay of San Francisco, and fortify and found a mission there. Accordingly, with Crespi, twelve soldiers, a muleteer and an Indian, Fages started for San Francisco. The party returned in April without doing anything of importance.
During Fages' absence Serra had received messages detailing great destitution and sickness at San Diego. Relief was sent, but this so depleted his store that during May, June and July Fages kept the men at the presidio, and the people at the mission, alive on bear's meat. Fages and Serra decided to return to San Diego. The occasion seeming opportune, the president resolved on his way home to establish one of the new missions at Canada de los Osos. He therefore took with him Padre Caballer, the mission guard and the required vestments and utensils. A site called by the natives Tixlini was selected, half a league from the canyon, but within sight of it. On September 1, 1772, Junipero raised the Christian symbol, said mass, and
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thus ushered in the mission of San Luis Obispo de Tolosa. Caballer was left to labor alone at first, with five soldiers and two Indians to work on the building. The natives were well disposed, recalling past kind- ness, and were willing to be taught the new religion and mode of living. They were ready to work, offered their children for baptism, and helped with their seeds to eke out the friar's scanty food supply. The mission prospered and grew wealthy. Fine buildings were erected, some of which are in good state of preserva- tion to the present day, and a great number of converts were made.
Twenty-five years after the founding of the San Luis Obispo mission, or in July, 1797, the site for another mission in this county was chosen at a place called Los Posas by the Spaniards, and Vania by the natives. Here Padres Laserem and Sitar founded an establishment which, in honor of the Archangel Mich- ael, was named San Miguel. This, too, grew rapidly, and there was soon a large number of Gentiles gath- ered here for purposes of conversion. Padre Horra was placed in charge, but for some reason gave dis- satisfaction. Like the mission of San Luis Obispo the one at San Miguel went through the same history of prosperity and adversity, and when the American oc- cupation occurred but few traces of its former grandeur remained. Of the buildings covering many acres of ground, only one now remains, while the front porch of the church building is actually the private possession of an individual whose property line reaches to the wall of the structure itself.
From the time of the admission of California down to about five years ago, the growth of San Luis Obispo
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was slow. It was isolated and difficult of access, and population did not increase with any great speed. But with the advent of the railroad in 1887, this was changed, and since then great strides have been taken, particularly in the eastern part of the county. The county is one of the finest in the State, and embraces over 2,000,000 acres of fertile territory. It is almost as large as the State of Connecticut. San Luis Obispo has been deprived, by the caprice of chance, of direct railroad communication; she has been con- temptuously condemned by the arrogance of igno- rance as a "cow county." She has wilted and almost withered beneath the traditional lethargy of her silu- rian settlers; but, with the speedy completion of the Southern Pacific railroad, a radical change has already commenced-a resurrection is at hand. The gap between Elwood and Santa Margarita will soon be closed, and that will be the route taken by passengers east by way of New Orleans.
At San Luis Obispo, with only 3,000 inhabitants, there is over $1,000,000 lying on deposit in the three banks. Within the past year many notable improve- ments have been completed. A much needed system of sewerage has been laid down; a magnificent county bank has been built; a club, in its small way as luxurious as the Pacific Union, has been organized Chrome reduction works and an ice factory wil. shortly be in full blast, while numerous new build- ings testify abundantly to a generous confidence in the future. Nor has progress stayed her hand at San Luis. Arroyo Grande, Niponee and Paso Robles, bear eloquent witness to the contrary. In Paso Robles upwards of a quarter of a million dollars has been
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expended in private and municipal improvements since last Christmas. This town boasts a superb hotel, an elaborate bath-house, a street railway, and an ever- growing reputation for push and enterprise.
The taxable property of the county in 1884 was $6,000,000 ; to-day it is $20,000,000. The population in 1880 was 9,142. It is now more than 20,000. San Luis raises the biggest onions in the world, some of them weighing four pounds apiece. Her cabbages are Brobdignagian. Her pumkins might be converted into coaches without the fairy wand of Cinderella's god- mother. Her potatoes are simply monstrous; one of them would prove a meal for Garantua himself. She makes, moreover, the finest butter and cheese in Cali- fornia, but these, the industries of her infancy, will give place in her maturity to others more complex and remunerative. Prunes do especially well. One orchard this season has netted its fortunate owner $175 per acre. An eminent authority has pronounced the east- ern slopes of the Coast range to be the special domain of the Sauterne grape. A walnut tree, carelessly planted in the garden of one of the city fathers, pro- duced this year a crop that sold for $35, a most per- tinent fact and almost incredible.
But San Luis Obispo prides herself upon more esthetic features than those just enumerated. If she appeals to the poor she appeals also to the rich. Her scenery is pastoral and charming. Her climate is salu- brious, equable and delightful alike in summer and winter. At Pismo there is the best clam beach in the world, dear alike to the horseman and the gourmand, a broad ribbon of hard, dazzling sand more than twenty miles long, the finest road in the State. There are
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trout in the brooks, quail and deer in the hills, and ducks upon the lakes. There is, in a word, profit for all and pleasure for all. To the farmer, the horticul- turist, the invalid and the sportsman San Luis Obispo holds out her hand in cordial greeting. She courts in- vestigation, she invites criticism, and she demands, first and last, recognition.
When the improvements at Port Harford are com- pleted, sie will possess an excellent harbor, destined to be the terminus of a transcontinental road. Her fisheries are most valuable and almost unexploited. Her mineral springs are famous the world over. Her soil, with proper cultivation, yields many and diverse treasures. She produces all the cereals and fruits of the temperate zone with a truly tropical exuberance. In her mountains are quicksilver, onyx unexcelled in the world, copper, coal, chrome, iron, granite, gold and silver. There are inexhaustible supplies of asphaltum and bitumen, and beneath these deposits are vast reservoirs of petroleum vet undeveloped.
K ERN COUNTY was organized in 1866, from the territory originally assigned to Mariposo. It derives its name from the river discovered and named by Lientenant Moraga years before. The fur traders trapped the beaver in the San Joaquin river and tributaries before the discovery of gold; but Cap- tain C. H. Weber, the founder of Stockton, was the first permanent settler in the valley. The broad plains and beautiful rivers of this section had attracted many Mexican rancheros, who, with their fatted herds, enjoyed the greatest freedom. Later the mining inter
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ests predominated; only for a short season, however, as the husbandman's plow no sooner turned the soil than the beautiful yield gladdened the hearts of the settlers, and in a few years the lowing herds gave way to ham- lets and villages. These early settlers were good, old- fashioned people who cared very little for politics and the outside world, and stayed at home and tilled their farms, raised stock, made money, and were contented and happy.
The county seat of Kern, when first established, was fixed at Havilah, a town which owed its prominence to mining. In 1874 it was removed to Bakersfield, on the Southern Pacific railroad, and as that has been made a small city by the combined influence of the fruits and vines and the railroad, it will suffer no farther inter- ference. Indeed the Southern Pacific Company has made the immense progress and prosperity of Kern county possible, as it has every one of the sections reached by its great number of branches.
In the early part of 1854 a party of emigrants on their way from Los Angeles discovered gold within the limits of what is now known as Kern county. The news of the finding of the precious metal spread rapidly throughout the State, but it was not till 1857 that the great rush, called the Kern river gold excite- ment, memorable throughout the State, as one of these periodical furors which in former years so peculiarly characterized California, was made. Soon the mount- ains swarmed with eager men searching for gold, and it was not long till other discoveries were made, and French Gulch, Spanish Gulch, Havilah, Keysville and other places of similar character and names were found to contain a considerable amount of the precious metal.
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The placers which had been found in the gulches, and bars and flats along the river, were soon exhausted, and attention was turned to the source of the treasure and efforts made to discoverit. Numerous small leads, and one large one were found near Keysville, and a quartz mill was erected in the vicinity in 1859. It was soon found that without large capital mining in this county was not profitable, and soon placer mining was entirely abandoned and quartz mining became the dominant interest. After being successfully worked for a number of years the inhabitants of the camps turned their attention toward agriculture. But of late years the discovery of better and more economical methods of working gold-bearing ores has led to a partial resumption of quartz mining, and there is good promise for the future.
In earlier times this section was only a cattle and sheep pasture. Later it was noted for its fine breed of horses, principally those raised by J. B. Haggin on his famous Rosedale farm. Now it is becoming cele- brated for its fine fruits. Its peaches are among the best produced in the State. Five large and prosperous colonies have been established in the Kern delta, three of which have been more recently planted by the Kern County Land Company and are in a prosperous condition. The Deacon Brothers, from Indiana, are inducing colonists from their old neighborhood to settle near Bakersfield. Other colonies are being pro- moted. A majority of the residents of two of these colonies are English people, and they seem to be very contented in their new homes. Rosedale colony is the largest and has been improved to such an extent that it looks like a garden. Large vineyards have been
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planted and will give their first good yield the coming season.
This valley, or what is called the Kern delta, is undoubtedly the coming garden spot of the San Joaquin valley. There is no kind of fruit that does not grow here to perfection, owing to the excellent cli- mate and the peculiar formation of the soil. The irrigation system being owned and controlled by a company of a few persons, and under one management, it can be made to produce the best results. The culti- vation of alfalfa is one of the main industries, and corn, Egyptian corn and beets grow and yield immensely. There are several fine orange orchards in the foothills of the Tehachapi range, the principal one being owned by General Beal on his famous Tejon ranch. Delano, Sumner and Tehachapi are all thriving towns, and altogether Kern county is proud of her present condition and has flattering prospects for the future. The shipments of wheat, fruit and other products of Kern county by the Pacific railroad from Bakersville for the year 1892 amounted to about $2,500,000 in value.
ANTA BARBARA COUNTY is one of the original sub-divisions of the State, with the town of Santa Barbara for the county seat. It is the most desirable residence locality in the State, and produces everything needed to make life agreeable. A single point is in evidence which should prove this. The mission fathers were renowned for select- ing the loveliest and most fertile and healthy spots for their missionary abodes. San Buenaventura, Santa
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Barbara, Lompoc, Purisima and Santa Ynez were at one time within the boundaries of Santa Barbara county.
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