USA > California > California gold book : first nugget, its discovery and discoverers, and some of the results proceeding therefrom > Part 28
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Mr. Baldwin has been referred to as capable of " keeping a hotel." The Baldwin at San Francisco, the Tallac at Lake Tahoe, and the Oakwood, at Arcadia, were all constructed under his instructions, and are owned by him. Money has not been spared in improv- ing the natural advantages about the Tallac and Oak- wood, of which Mr. Lawrence is given the management. No point in Italy or Switzerland can surpass the scenery about Lake Tahoe in beauty and grandeur, and
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everywhere but in California guests would never tire of the changing tints upon the mountains overlooking the San Gabriel valley. Besides the railroads named, a coach and four makes the round trip from Los Angeles to Oakwood every day, and many thousand, in the course of the year, take the trip, lunching at the Oak- wood with Mr. Lawrence.
One of the first great irrigation ventures in Califor- nia was that consummated by the San Diego Land and Town Company, which owned the National rancho, Otay rancho, Chula Vista, National City town site, and other mesa and valley properties, constituting a body of land over 40,000 acres in extent. It was all adapted to irrigation, without which its wonderful fertil- ity would be expended in the propagation of grease wood, sagebrush, and other unsightly and worthless shrubbery. Water must be had. The company obtained water rights on the Sweetwater river, so called through courtesy, as during the greatest portion of the year it was scarcely entitled to the name of rivulet. Here was constructed the Sweetwater dam, which has become familiar to most readers of the United States, and has been investigated by Government engineers, and very many others in California and other States and Territories in the arid region, who desired to take advantage of the splendid specimen of hydraulic engineering furnished by this admirable system.
The Sweeterwater dam is unlike others in some important respects. The bottom of the river canyon was excavated to solid bedrock. From the foundation, which is forty-six feet thick, it is built of solid granite, laid in Portland cement, and is constructed as an arch, with the elliptic facing the great weight of water.
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The length of the wall at the base is seventy-six feet, and at the top, 396 feet, and the thickness at the top is twelve feet. The height from bedrock is ninety feet, and from the bed of the river, eighty feet. The granite walls of the canyons are immovable as the everlasting mountains, and the ends of the dam are cemented to these. A thousand times the weight of water pressing against this dam would only serve to strengthen it, and even now it has been frequently subjected to the pressure of over six billion gallons of water. It is a sample of engineering which reflects great credit on all concerned, and has brought the services of Mr. Jas. D. Schuyler into general demand as consulting engineer in other great irrigation works.
Now the San Diego Land and Town Company have plenty of water to amply supply all their great acreage of mesa and valley lands. The effects produced in the last four years are simply wonderful. Starting with the finest climate to be found in fortunate California, where the climate reduces the cost of subsistence fully one-half, and renders living a peren- neal joy, and with a soil which has been drawing every valuable element of fertility from the disintegrating rocks on the mountains for unnumbered ages, and with a location which is indeed Chula Vista, meaning a "surpassingly beautiful view," with its background of mountains, and the cities of National City and San Diego, the placid bay, the peninsula of Coronado, ending in a vast perpetual bouquet of ever blooming beauty, and the promontory of Point Loma to the front, it is not strange that orange, lemon and olive orchards are crowding each other throughout the whole extent.
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The company, whose main office is in the Mason building, at 70 Kilby street, Boston, have been most fortunate in the selection of managing officers at National City. The late Colonel W. C. Dickinson was as genial as the climate in which he lived, and his mantle has fallen upon a younger man, Mr. John E. Boal, who presents the charming attractions of the vast domain with the same intelligent clearness for which his predecessor was noted.
This irrigation system has supplied the only ingredient lacking to make this section the most desir- able on earth. With seasons which are a perpetual Indian summer, water as pure and healthful as can be distilled from snow and ice, and soil whose fertility is unrivaled, the resident who would make complaint of his surroundings deserves no great blessing on earth or in heaven.
There is no place in California where the effects of water have been as remarkable as at Redlands, at the upper end of Santa Ana valley. In 1885 this was a sheep ranch, somewhat remote from transportation, but most romantically situated. Forty miles away, and across a considerable range of mountains, it was practicable to build a reservoir which would store water sufficient to irrigate many times the twelve miles square contained in this district. There were no improvements here of consequence. Hill and valley were covered with sagebrush, greasewood and cactus. Tarantulas, centipedes and scorpions were abundant. Beyond the grandeur and beanty of the scenery, there was nothing specially attractive about the location. To-day several trains each way reach the city on tracks which have been laid by both the Southern Pacific and
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Santa Fe companies. Redlands has become a city of 4,000 of the happiest and most contented people to be found anywhere. They have every lot, including the churchyards, planted to orange trees, and in February. 1893, these were bending beneath the weight of golden fruit. There are two street railroads which convey persons to the high points overlooking the prosperous and picturesque valley, and the grand piles of brick and stone which constitute the business center of the compactly built city. The business of the post-office in 1888 was $1,868, and for 1892, something over $8,000.
The hills-mountains' foothills-adjoining Redlands on the southeast are covered with bearing orchards of lemons and oranges, and in very many places the hill- sides are so steep that they required terracing before there was room on which to plant a tree. There are many points in California which bear testimony to what the railroads and water can do in the way of changing an unsightly waste into a bower of flowers and fruitfulness, but there are none where the progress and prosperity attending the use of these gifts of God are more marked than at Redlands-in less than seven years changed from a desert to a garden of beauty and golden wealth.
Without water for irrigation there was no more unpromising desert in California than the upper end of Santa Ana valley. To be sure some water had been utilized from the Santa Ana river and Mill creek, but it was insufficient for even the partial reclamation of any great part of the thousands of acres tributary to Red lands. Then human courage and enterprise took a hand. The mountains to the north and east climb away
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toward the firmament, and the higher points of some of them are mantled perpetually with ice and snow. At some time before white prospectors took an interest in the San Bernardino range, a natural reservoir or lake existed high up in the mountains. How its walls became cleft, letting all its water discharge down through the canyons, is among the natural mysteries with which every California canyon abounds. How to repair the break and create a reservoir capable of storing several time as much water as the valley would require in the dryest season, was no mystery. To con- duct it to the numerous places where it would do most good was the problem. Courage, energy and capital constitute a masterly triumvirate. These were enlisted, and on November 15, 1890, the Bear Valley Irriga- tion Company was organized with four million dollars capital, Six distributing reservoirs were constructed near where the water would be needed, and from the great lake in the mountains the pure water is now conveyed to these reservoirs ; thence is carried to every owner of five, ten, twenty or more acres in the valley. There are about 25,000 acres of fruit lands tributary to Redlands. But this Bear Valley Irrigation Company does not intend to confine its life and wealth-giving power toRedlands. The Pacific railroad passes through Gorgona pass, and has a station called Brookside about two miles from the center of Redlands. Five miles beyond that, and across a considerable mountain, in the San Jacinto valley, is as fine a body of land as there is in the State. It is equal to anything at River- side, Redlands or in San Gabriel valley-that is, with water. As the Bear Valley Irrigation Company owns over twenty thousand acres of the best of these lands,
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self-defense required that some of its surplus water be carried to a section known as the Alessandro irrigation district. There are only about four thousand acres in the district not owned by the Bear Valley Irrigation Company. Most of the difficult engineering is accom- plished, the mountains tunneled, and very soon the water will be turned on to every tract in the district- that is, it will be ready to flow, as when and where desired. The experience of Redlands will be repeated, but on a quicker plane, because the Sunset trains of the Southern Pacific pass on one side, and the Santa Fe runs directly through the tract. Alessandro will not have Scipio Craig and his fast-running pen and press to record every mark of improvement ; but he is near enough to keep the outside world advised of the start- ing of street-car lines, organization of banks and building of churches, all of which will be incidents of Alessandro in the coming year. Next year it will be a city. Chas. W. Green, late of Murray Hill, New York City, is now the president of the Bear Valley Irriga. tion Company. He has been identified with the interests of the company from the start, but at long range. How he must have appreciated the fertility of the soil and the miraculous power of water which could produce a city in the desert almost as quickly as Jonah's gourd came to maturity! And beautiful Red- lands must make no halt in her progress or Alessandro will pass her by. Irrigation has decreed it.
In Fresno, Tulare and Kern counties, irrigation has worked wonders. The snows which bury the tops of the mountains to great depths in winter, and slowly turn to water during the summer, have been utilized for the use and enrichment of thousands. The hun-
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dreds of miles of canals, and thousands of miles of ditches, with which these counties are checkered, would never have been constructed by men of small capital. It required men of large means like J. B. Haggin, Lloyd Tevis, George Hearst, Dr. C. B. Perrin, Henry Miller, Judge W. F. Goad, Irwin C. Stump and others who deserve mention, who, as proprietors of great bodies of unproductive land, had to put water upon the fertile acres in self-defense. The transformation has been most wonderful, and God, water and the railroads, sup- plemented and accentuated by the enterprise and energy of patriotic men, has prepared these counties for the luxurious support of as many people as there are in the whole State of New York, including her great cities. First, the underground rivers were tapped, and vast volumes of water answered the call, and an arid waste became clothed in luxuriant verdure and perpet- ual bloom. The artesian wells emphasized the neces- sity for water, and proved the unexcelled fertility of the soil. They accomplished something much greater. They convinced the great cattle kings, whose herds held dominion everywhere, that it was criminal to deny the use of these acres to horticultur- ists and vineyardists. The result was the canals and ditches, and the inauguration of the plan of small tracts, and the colonizing of the thrifty and industrious from the crowded centers of population in the East and in Europe. With scarcely an exception, all who have come have been benefited, and have proved fore- runners of others equally anxious to share in blessings which must be enjoyed before they can be credited or appreciated. Mr. Hughes, a land dealer in Fresno, gives his experience with purchasers, which goes far
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to show the extraordinary prosperity which prevails. Up to 1893 he had sold 30,000 acres of land near Fresno, in ten, twenty and forty acre tracts. No first payment was required, but each purchaser bound him- self to plant a certain proportion of the tract to trees and vines in a given time. He foreclosed but four mortgages, and not a dozen gave up their purchase because of inability to comply with the terms. It is not usual to sell lands on credit, but this is probably a fair statement of the proportion of purchasers of lands with water in California, who default in payment from any cause. California ranchers borrow money some- times, but the cases where mortgages are foreclosed are very rare.
The San Jacinto valley contains about 200,000 acres of very rich land, lying partly in San Bernardino and partly in San Diego county. It is at an altitude of from 1,400 to 1,900 feet above sea-level, with about the proper incline to render it easily irrigated, and composed of such soil as would not bake after a thorough wetting. Experiment has proved it exactly adapted to the production of fine lemons, oranges, olives, peaches, apricots and raisins, and inferior to no portion of the State for Alfalfa and vegetables.
The Jacinto valley is especially fortunate in its transportation facilities. The Santa Fe system has a line under the name of the Southern California which traverses the valley from end to end, with several branches. The Southern Pacific has a line near the upper end of the valley, and both companies are steadily extending their lines to every point where set- tlements of orchardists and vineyardists are probable. This gives speedy and cheap connection with mnarkets
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everywhere. A considerable portion of the valley produced fine crops of wheat and barley in seasons when there was an average rainfall, without irrigation ; but the crop was not certain. For profitable culture water was a necessity. The maximum value of the land for grain crops was $30 per acre without water, and that best adapted for fruit growing from $50 to $60. With a supply of water the minimum price would be $100 per acre for wholly unimproved lands.
The Bear Valley Irrigation Company is interested in supplying water to the upper end of the San Jacinto Valley, and has completed its system for irrigating many thousands of acres in the Alessandro district. The Lake Hemet Water Company is now constructing what promises to be the highest dam in the world. The location selected was most favorable for the magnificent work. The canyon is about 5,000 feet above sea-level, and is only 80 feet wide at the bottom between immovable granite walls, and only 250 feet wide at the top. It is planned to run a dam 160 feet high, which is practicable, when the reservoir back of it will hold eleven billion gallons of water, and sufficient to thoroughly irrigate all the land in the valley which is not supplied by the Bear Valley Irrigation Company. The work so far performed has been the best of its kind. First the bottom of the canyon was excavated by blasting until a smooth and solid bottom was obtained for the wall, to be 100 feet thick at the base. This was filled with granite blocks, weighing from five to fifteen tons, cemented together, until practically one unbroken stone. This solid base, equal to the unbroken granite upon which it rests, is carried up twelve feet, where the walls of the
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canyon are eighty feet apart. From thence to the top the upper and lower faces of the dam are composed of layers of these immense granite blocks, and the interior is composed of granite blocks nearly as large, laid in concrete of washed sand and the best Portland cement, under the supervision of trained engineers, who have the benefit of the experience of J. D. Schuyler, the great engineer, who constructed the world-renowned Sweetwater dam, and who says of this: "When completed, it will unquestionably be, not only the highest, but the finest dam on the continent-strong, safe, solid, and secure for all ages."
The labor-saving machinery, capable of handling granite blocks weighing thirty tons, was selected by Mr. E. L. Mayberry, manager of the company. Without the aid of such devices it would have been almost impossible to have constructed this great work, using such ponderous blocks of granite as are cemented into its wall. This irrigation system drains a water- shed of over 100 square miles of snow-clad mountain. It will cover 700 acres of land when filled, with an average depth of 65 feet. The water is as pure as can be derived from melted snow, and will be carried to dwellers in the valley under a 2,000 foot pressure, rendering it more available than a steam pump for sprinkling yards and suppressing conflagrations.
It would be interesting to give a detailed description of all the many irrigation systems in the State. They are doing a wonderful work, and making the arid spots to laugh with the gladness of a superb benevo- lence. It has not been practicable to mention but few or give a detailed description of any. The windmills of the State, for which a propelling breeze may be
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safely counted upon a portion of every twenty-four hours in the year, are supplying water for irrigating many thousand acres of flower and vegetable gardens, orchards, and vineyards. Many persons are using pumps driven by gasoline engines to raise water to the mesas and hillsides where it is a necessity. Water is king in California, and his subjects bow down to him early and late, and use every conceivable means to obtain more intimate acquaintance with him. Ir many parts of the State there is no prospect that the supply of water will ever be in excess, and plans are being devised to make a little water go a great way, because upon the economical use of it depends the prosperity of the people.
CHAPTER XVIII.
ASPHALTUM.
This valuable substance is found in many States of this Union, but not to an extent to render it of com- mercial importance outside of California. In several counties of California there are great quantities of what is known as bituminous rock or sand-stone, and which has been largely used in the construc- tion of sidewalks, street pavements, cement for yard walks, and very many other purposes. It is found in abundant deposits in San Bernardino, San Joaquin, Los Angeles and Orange counties, and in deposits of vast extent in San Luis Obispo, Santa Cruz, Santa Barbara, Ventura and Kern counties. Very much of that found requires refining before it will justify shipment for long distances ; but the bulk of the known deposits will pay for refining, rendering it superior to that
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found elsewhere on the globe so far as known. Val de Travers in Switzerland, and the pitch Lake of Trinidad, West Indies, supply about all in use in Paris, London and Berlin, and most of that which has been used in the Eastern cities has been brought from Lake Trinidad. The demand for it is increasing rapidly. Engineers and contractors now acknowledge the superiority of this material for paving streets, alleys and sidewalks; flooring warehouses, cellars, fruit canneries, barns and stables; and for lining reservoirs, flumes and ditches. It makes a superb lining for wells and cisterns, and is said to make an unequaled water-pipe or main by using heavy duck-cloth as a base or core. It does not impart any taste to water, and disease germs and vermin avoid it. As a coating for piles to be used in salt or other water use has proved it invaluable. There is no doubt that it will supplant hard rubber for many purposes, being much cheaper and possessing many other advantages.
But it is on streets and road ways that it is going to prove most valuable. The wheelmen of America are great educators. They have not been long in the field, but in the short time they have been walking on wheels, they have done much to convince mankind that good roadways are as necessary and economical for farmers as for the dwellers in cities. They are enemies of the noisy, dusty, disease-germ generating cobble- stone, basalt block or any other kind of stone pavement ; every argument used by them for clean, noiseless and healthy pavements is an argument in favor of the use of California asphalt for roadways, whether in city or country.
It will seem strange to the reader that while Cali-
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fornia possesses more and better Asphalt than all the world besides, Buffalo, New York, and several other Eastern cities have more asphalt pavement than San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego combined. It is another evidence that a "prophet is not without honor except in his own country." It is a condition of things which will not continue. Los Angeles has five miles of clean asphalt pavement; San Diego a like amount, and San Francisco probably more than twice as much. Oakland has considerable of the best quality, and many smaller places have fine educating samples. These object lessons are producing an effect upon enterprising citizens, and causing them to support enthusiastically the efforts of such persistent advocates of noiseless and dustless pavements as Henry F. Wil- liams, of San Francisco, who has been battling against silurianism for more than twenty years, and almost single-handed. Day is breaking. If the doctors may insist that the streets must be closed in front of the house of a prominent or wealthy patient, men of moderate means may be excused for demanding that their sick ones shall be protected from the useless and dangerous clatter made by vehicles passing over unsightly cobble stones. The germ is working. Within five years the majority of the streets in San Francisco will be covered with clean, noiseless, sightly germ-proof sheet asphalt pavement, and two glorious results will be attained : San Francisco will not have a single fault, but will be the most delightful summer residence city in the world, and a valuable and abund- ant California product will receive recognition as God intended it should when He made it the most valuable paving substance in Nature,
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The asphalt deposits in Kern county have been known to exist for many years. As far back as February 20, 1864, a company with a capital of $1,700,000, was organized to utilize the vast body of asphaltum known to exist on the western edge of the county. Crude machinery, want of experience, lack of transportation facilities, and other apparent causes, impeded exploitation, and this company practically ceased to exist. Other companies were organized, mainly with the object of boring for oil, and have severally spent considerable money, but have generally accomplished little more than to confirm the belief that the deposits were of great value. There are two important districts, known respectively as the Sunset and Buena Vista fields. The Sunset field lies at the foot of the San Emigdio range of mountains, and the asphalt mounds or deposits here cover upwards of five thousand acres. A number of wells have been bored for oil, and six are now producing the heavy black oil known as maltha, and which carries a heavy percent- age of very pure bitumen. The Buena Vista fields lie considerably north of the Sunset works, but at the foot of the same range of mountains. The asphalt mounds here cover over ten thousand acres of the surface, and the supply is known to be unlimited. The value of these deposits no man can safely estimate. It is into the hundreds of millions. No one will doubt this who considers the great number of uses calling for this material above enumerated, and the rapidity with which new uses for it are discovered.
The asphalt deposits in Kern county seem to be different from any others in the State. Those of greatest purity in Ventura county are practically per-
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pendicular true veins, of no great thickness, between granite or slate walls. The bituminous rock mines are not taken into consideration, because the percentage of fixed bitumen is small in them compared with the pro- duct from the Kern county mines. In the Buena Vista and Sunset fields the layers of asphaltum are horizontal. The appearance indicates that at some period liquid asphaltum, or maltha, was forced from the interior of the earth, and spread out in great vol- ume over the surface of the valley. In time the flow ceased, and the body hardened by the evaporation of the volatile substance it contained. Then sand, grass, sagebrush and mountain debris must have accumulated upon the layer until nature was ready to produce another discharge of liquid asphaltum. How long the alternating action continued no one can tell, but borings in one place show that the alternating stratas are over 300 feet deep, and there is no reason to suppose they may not extend to much greater depths.
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