Imperial County, CA History

Transcribed by Sally Kaleta

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SOURCE:  The History of Imperial County - Elms & Franks, Berkeley, 1918.
 
CHAPTER II
 FORMATION OF THE COLORADO DESERT
 
 
                Long ago, before the memory of man, but comparatively recent 
from a geological standpoint, in what is known as the middle tertiary period, 
the waters of the Gulf of California reached up as far as the slopes of Mounts 
San Jacinto and San Bernardino, taking in all the region now known as the 
Imperial Valley, Salton Basin and Coachella Valley, an area of over 3000 square 
miles; the whole of the present delta into which emptied the erratic and 
unreliable Colorado River - the real heroine of the romance of the desert - for 
without the Colorado the waters of the sea would still bathe the foot of the 
mountains.
               Although deprived of a part of its glory by a misnaming of the 
upper branches, the Colorado is one of the long rivers of the world, being about 
2000 miles in length, including the Green River, which unites with the Grand to 
form the Colorado, the Green being really a continuation of the Colorado itself. 
The river drains a region of about  300,000 square miles, the southwestern part 
of Wyoming, west Colorado, east Utah, Nevada, and new and old Mexico. Most of 
the land is extremely dry, with an average rainfall of only 8 1/2 inches, the 
river being supplied chiefly from the melting snow of the mountainous parts of 
Wyoming, Utah, and Colorado.
                The Colorado Valley is distinctly divided into two sections. The 
greater part of the lower third is but little above the level of the sea, some 
parts in fact being more than 200 feet below the sea level, but here and there 
occasional mountain ranges rise to a height of from 2000 to 6000 feet.
                Its northern boundary is an almost vertical wall of cliffs, 
often thousands of feet high. The tableland which forms the rest of the valley 
is from four to eight thousand feet above the sea, and is surrounded on all 
sides but the south by snow-capped mountains, some of which are 14,000 feet 
high. The whole upper part of the Colorado Basin is cut by innumerable gorges of 
inaccessible depths, caused by the river and its branches. They are dry, 
however, except during the rainy season and when the snow melts on the 
mountains. 
               The erosion by the Colorado and its tributaries has played a 
leading part in making the geography of the country. All of the silt, broken and 
powdered rocks, vegetation and other rubbish eroded by a river is held in 
suspension while the river is moving rapidly; it is only when it spreads out, 
becoming shallow and sluggish, that its burden is deposited along the banks and 
on the bottom. The Colorado reached no such point until it emptied into the Gulf 
of California, known at various times as the "Sea of Cortez," the "Sea of 
California" and the Vermillion Sea," the latter name originating from the red 
color imparted by the sediment-laden river, which has been called "The Nile of 
America."
              That the valley was originally an arm of the gulf is shown by the 
shell incrustations and reefs of oyster shells. That the level of the country 
was raised by volcanic uplifts as some contend seems to be disproved by the fact 
that the water lines are all unbroken and do not show any evidence of any 
convulsions of nature. Hence the theory that the formation of the valley was 
caused by the silt of the Colorado spreading over the bottom of the gulf, thus 
displacing the water, seems the right one. Little by little the silt was 
deposited, and little by little the sea retreated, until what had been the sea 
became low marshy land, with the river meandering through banks of its own 
creating. But with the melting of the mountain snow the sluggish, sleepy river, 
basking lazily in the sun, became a veritable demon of savage irresponsibility, 
going wherever it would and leaving its burden. At such times it broke all 
bounds set by previous deposits. During one such flood such a vast amount of 
debris was deposited that an area in front of its mouth was covered by silt 
which rose higher than the normal height of the river, so that when the flood 
subsided a great dam was formed which shut off the northern portion of the gulf 
(now the Imperial, Salton, and Coachella valleys).  The channel connecting the 
two portions must have become more and more shallow until it filled up so that 
the tide no longer flowed in and out, thus forming a lake the southern 
boundaries of which were the silt and mud from the Colorado
                 Prof. Blake's theory, formed from his investigations when with 
the Williamson expedition, is that at first this lake was kept fresh by channels 
from the river, but these filling up shut off the supply, and being shut away 
from the sea also, a rapid process of evaporation took place under the hot rays 
of the sun and the dry winds, and in the course of a few years the lake dried 
up. Wharton James on the contrary contends that as the shut-off portion of the 
gulf contained salt water, that it evaporated by natural processes, and was 
filled with fresh water by the outflow from the Colorado breaking over channel 
and dam and forming the ancient Alamo River through which part of the Colorado 
flowed into the basin and created a fresh-water lake, which it continued to 
supply as the years passed, keeping as a lake for a time what had been first an 
arm of the gulf, then a dry basin hundreds of feet below the sea level, then a 
lake, then dry land again, but how often this region alternated between being 
Lake and dry land no one knows.
                It is assumed the Indians occupied the basin while dry, which 
will explain their tradition that after they had lived there many years they 
were driven out by the floods. This may have happened many times before another 
flood epoch came and built a new dam across the Alamo channel, which closed the 
fresh water supply, and the Salton Sea again dried up until it was filled by 
accident in 1905 through a miscalculation of the Southern California Improvement 
Company's constructing engineer as to what might be expected of the Colorado 
River, giving the modern world the opportunity to see Nature at work. But while 
the cut made by the Southern California Improvement Company was responsible for 
the divergence of the river primarily, scientists believe from the behavior of 
the river since that it would have happened from natural causes shortly, anyway. 
But what was of no particular moment in prehistoric times became a calamity when 
the  basin was occupied by railroads, farms, orchards and homes. Hence at the 
present time all the ingenuity of man is being brought to bear upon the problem 
of curbing the riotous Colorado and making it return to its former channel.
                The land formed by the deposit from the river was exceedingly 
rich, but unfortunately, except for flood waters, extremely dry, the annual 
rainfall, as before stated, averaged only about 8 1/2 inches, and it presented 
all the aspects of a desert land.
                 The Colorado Desert, which is the local name given by Prof. 
Blake in 1853 to that portion of the great Sonorian Desert which lies between 
Parker, Arizona, and Picacho, California, a long, narrow strip of country 
containing not less than 500,000 acres of alluvial soil, needing only water to 
make it fertile. The temperature registers as low as 17 degrees, and 
occasionally in summer as high as 125 degrees. In the cool of the morning the 
air is very stimulating and invigorating, but the heat of the afternoon is 
intense and exhausting. The rainy season is from December to February, but 
sometimes there are showers in the heart of summer.
EARLY EXPEDITIONS 
 
             The region around the Gulf of California and the Colorado Valley 
was visited by many of the earlier adventurers who in the interest of Spain were 
seeking places of colonization and conquest, and incidentally some of the vast 
wealth supposed to be possessed by the original owners of the soil. In 1539 
Cortez sent an expedition, consisting of three vessels, up the waters of the 
gulf, which at that time was supposed to be a long strait leading to the North 
Sea, and Lower California was supposed to be an island.
             Ulloa was the leader of the expedition, and when he found his way 
barred by the deposits of a huge river, and alarmed by the rushing water of the 
"Bore," he returned without exploring it. In 1540 Alarcon was sent up the Gulf 
by Mendoza, the Spanish Viceroy, to explore, and later joined the last 
expedition under Coronado, who started overland about the same time. They were 
looking for the seven cities of Gibola, which were believed to possess fabulous 
wealth. Marcos, a Franciscan monk, inspired by the tales he heard from the 
Indians about these cities, started to investigate, and sent Estaban, a negro, 
ahead to reconnoiter. The latter, however, was captured and killed at the first 
Pueblo village, and Marcos, in terror of his life, fled with only a distant 
glimpse of the coveted cities. This did not prevent his giving Coronado, then 
governor of New Gallicia, a glowing account of their beauty and vast wealth, 
drawing on a lively imagination for what he lacked in actual experience and 
knowledge. Coronado lost no time in taking Marcos to Mexico, where Mendoza 
organized the two expeditions to hunt up these wonderful towns and appropriate 
their possessions.  
            Alarcon left his vessel at the mouth of the river and traveled 
upward for about sixteen miles. He discovered several harbors not seen by Ulloa, 
and also discovered that the natives were ignorant of most of the names 
supposedly characteristic of the region, that Marcos had given, and it began to 
dawn upon him that the good father was a romancer of considerable skill and 
fluency. However, the natives themselves told marvelous tales of things to be 
seen inland, but no news of Coronado, so Alarcon returned to his vessel. A 
little later he again ascended the river about 85 leagues, according to his 
estimate, but probably much less when we consider the winding course of the 
river. He left letters for Diaz at the foot of a large cross, and Diaz, who came 
by land to the spot, claimed the distance to be the first white men to walk on 
the Colorado Desert. 
            After reading Alarcon's letter, Diaz followed the course of the 
river for nearly a week, then crossed over on rafts owing to the hostility of 
the natives, undoubtedly the Yumas, who even now consider the white man a 
trespasser. They consented to help Diaz cross the river, thinking this would 
give them an opportunity to separate the party and then destroy them. Diaz, 
however, was sufficiently alert to meet them on their own ground; becoming 
suspicious, one of the Indians was subjected to torture until he admitted the 
plot. In the engagement which followed Diaz by his superior weapons was able to 
drive the Indians back into the mountains, but four days wandering in the desert 
was enough for him and he was glad to leave further exploration to others.
            In 1604 Juan de Onate went from San Juan de los Caballeros, a small 
town near the present location of Santa Fe, toward the west. He crossed New 
Mexico and left his autograph chiseled on a rock called El Moro. He went up the 
Colorado to tidewater and returned in April, 1605.  He was the last known white 
man to visit the region until the missions were established.
             All the early maps represent California as an Island, and the Gulf 
of Mexico as a strait extending nearly to 50 degrees north latitude, and Sir 
Francis Drake named it New Albion, supposing it to be an island separate from 
the Spanish New World; this error was perpetuated in the English maps as late as 
1721, although Father Kino and his associates show by his map of about 1700 that 
they understood California was a peninsula and that the Colorado River was 
responsible for the land formed at the head of the gulf. According to one 
historian, Father Consag, or Sontag, made the first survey of the gulf in 1746. 
He passed up the western side of the gulf in small boats and reached the mouth 
of the Colorado, the land around which, he said, was low and swampy, red in 
color, and so soft that his men could not stand on it. After the Franciscans had 
established five missions in Upper California, or "Alta California," as it was 
called to distinguish it from the Peninsula, it was found to be a long and 
tedious trip between them and the Sonora missions the way they had to go (i.e., 
by way of the gulf and up the Peninsula), and the missionaries of Northern 
Sonora made several attempts to reach them by crossing the Colorado River, 
particularly Francisco Garces and the Jesuit Father Kino, who were very 
preserving in their efforts, and Garces finally succeeded in crossing the river 
and penetrating the desert for some distance, but without any results worth 
mentioning.
            At this time there were no white men in California except at the 
missions, and the whole region was one of desolation. The first Christian to 
make the trip across the desert was Sebastian, an Indian who had run away from 
the San Gabriel mission with his parents and wife, and crossed over to the 
Presidio of Tubac, about forty miles south of what is now Tuscon, Arizona. He 
had roamed far into the eastern part of the desert to avoid being captured by 
soldiers and returned as a deserter.  His family all died either from hardships 
or were killed by hostile Indians. It is certain Sebastian crossed the desert to 
Yuma where he was taken by natives to the Pima and Papago country and there met 
Captain Juan Bautista de Anza, who was a very gallant officer, at that time 
commandant of the Presidio of Tubac, and who had long been anxious to have a 
part in the colonization of California. Bucareli, the viceroy, was finally 
induced to give him a license to explore the country from Tubac to the 
California missions, and find a convenient and practical route for travelers to 
and from the missions. He started in January, 1774, with Sebastian for guide and 
Padres Garces and Font as his spiritual guides, and an escort of 34 men, 140 
horses, and 65 cattle. Reaching the river, de Anza made friends with Palma, 
chief of the Yuma Indians, who went with him across  the river and as far as a 
lagoon to the southwest, a body of water left by the last Colorado overflow. 
After Palma returned, De Anza wandered for six days in a region devoid of water 
and grass, and so desolate and barren that he returned to Palma for help. It is 
not known positively where he was during those six days, but if the lagoon to 
the southwest of Yuma was below the Mexican line there is reason to believe he 
was in what is now known as the Imperial Valley. Palma proved amenable to 
persuasion, and giving De Anza directions as to the proper path from one water 
hole to another, followed with the baggage, horses and cattle, and they thus had 
very little difficulty in making their way over the sand hills and into the 
Salton Basin, until they reached the San Gorgonio pass (which they called Puerto 
de San Carlo), over the Santa Ana River to San Gabriel. De Anza then went on to 
Monterey and sent Padre Garces back to the Colorado River to await his return. 
He stayed in Monterey three days and then returned, following Garces' trail.
            This journey of a thousand miles over untrod desert being 
successful, a second one was taken over the same route in 1775. This consisted 
of 240 people and over a thousand horses, mules, sheep, etc., and they went from 
Tubac to San Francisco. They evidently experienced unusual weather, for De 
Anza's diary tells of continued storms of rain, hail, and snow, accompanied by 
extremely low temperature. However, while many were sick, none died, although 
many were women; and eight desert-born infants raised their number to 248.
            The route which these two expeditions covered was used for a number 
of years. In 1780 Garces established two mission pueblos at Yuma , but Palma's 
influence was not enough to overcome the antagonism the Yumas always had for the 
traveler, and in June, 1781, Riviera, who had been governor of both Upper and 
Lower California, stopped at Yuma with a party of colonists he was taking to Los 
Angeles. He crossed the Colorado, and after sending his party on across the 
desert, camped on the east bank with twelve men. On Tuesday, July 17th, the 
Indians attacked the two Pueblos and Riviera and his soldiers and killed 
forty-six of them, including Riviera.  The massacre was discovered by Ensign 
Limon, who had escorted the settlers to San Gabriel. He was on his way back with 
nine men, when some desert natives told him of the outbreak. He left two men in 
charge of his animals and went forward to investigate; there the charred ruins 
of the buildings and the dead bodies lying about told their own story. While he 
was reconnoitering he was himself attacked, and he and eight men wounded. 
Starting to return to San Gabriel, he found the men he had left with the horses 
also killed. He with difficulty made his way back to San Gabriel with his bad 
news. In an attempt to punish the Yumas two forces were sent out at different 
times, one from Sonora and one from California, but as their efforts were but 
half-hearted, all they succeeded in in doing was to further embitter the Yumas 
against the white man without particularly impressing them with his authority 
and power. As a result there was a practical abandonment of the new route, 
although it was occasionally used.
            In 1782 Don Pedro Fages made the first trip from the Colorado to San 
Diego. In 1783 an attempt was made to follow the same route, but the party only 
went as far as the mountains and returned. The route was too difficult and few 
ever used it until the United States army of the west under Kearney came through 
in 1847, after which it became the southern route for the gold seekers.
            The first English-speaking man to look upon the Colorado Desert was 
probably Lieutenant Hardy of the British Royal Navy, who led an expedition sent 
out by England in 1800 hoping to find a river ascending from the Gulf of 
California far into the interior of the great northwest navigable for a 
sufficient distance to make it a commercial highway into the interior. The river 
he discovered, however, was a narrow, shallow  and sluggish stream, and with 
much difficulty he succeeded in passing the sand bars and low islands in the 
mouth, and finally entered a small lake. Not understanding the conditions he 
found, he landed and climbed a butte several hundred feet high which was washed 
by the waters of the lake to investigate. To the far north as far as the eye 
could reach stretched a barren and sun-blistered desert. The river of which he 
had expected such great things, was spread out over immense marshes. In his 
report he stated that the Colorado was not navigable. He manifestly was not in 
the channel which until 1906 was known as the Colorado River, but in one which 
ran from Volcano Lake to the Gulf and which has since been known as Hardy's 
Colorado, or sometimes the Hardy River. Geographers have believed all these 
years that Hardy overlooked the entrance to the real Colorado, but since that 
erratic stream has deserted its bed, and is flowing across the marshes into Rio 
Paradones, thence into Volcano Lake and out to the gulf by way of the Hardy, 
they are inclined to believe it was doing the same at the time of Hardy's 
expedition, as he could hardly have helped seeing the channel it had occupied 
for years.
            In 1807 Johnathan Trumball, a native of Connecticut, but known in 
California as Juan Jose Warner, took an expedition to Santa Fe, and soon after 
with Jackson, Waldo and Young, left for California. They crossed the Colorado 
below the Gila, and thence across the desert to San Diego via San Luis Rey. 
Warner engaged in various mercantile ventures in Los Angeles, and having become 
a naturalized Mexican citizen, was given a grant of land covering a ranch which 
still bears his name, to which he moved in 1844 with his family, remaining 
thirteen years, when they were driven off by an Indian uprising.
            About this time the American statesmen were awakening to the 
commercial value of the west and to try to save it for the United States. Mexico 
now being independent was the nominal owner of Spanish possessions in the 
southwest, but was too far away to hold a very tight rein. It was clear to any 
thinker that some stronger government would soon appropriate them. Both France 
and Great Britain were known to be just awaiting an excuse. Senator Benton of 
Missouri, the gateway of the west, from the reports of the possibilities of the 
country beyond, was most anxious to obtain it for his own country. However, his 
foresight was not shared by his colleagues who debated the matter in Congress 
with arguments which in the light of succeeding events seem to us very 
laughable. Petty politics also interfered. Finally, through Benton's efforts, 
John C. Fremont, a young engineer, was put in charge of an expedition whose 
secret intent was the occupation of the west by the United States. But even when 
he was ready to start petty politics interfered, and his wife, who was a 
daughter of Senator Benton (Jessie), intercepted and withheld the order, 
delaying them until the expedition was beyond reach, rather than see the fruit 
of her father's and husband's work lost by political filibustering. We probably 
owe it to her that California is one of the United States instead of a French or 
English colony, as Fremont was accidentally turned into California and his 
reports roused the whole country.
            In 1846 the Americans in Southern California, which was then part of 
the Mexican possessions, urged the government to send troops to protect them 
from the insults and depredations of an organized gang of Mexican bandits. Fort 
Leavenworth was the nearest fort to the coast, and the route between was little 
used and full of hardships, but as complaints and petitions were becoming more 
frequent, in June an order was issued to send a column of cavalry under Colonel 
Philip Kearny to their relief, with directions to proceed by the shortest route 
to San Diego. The war department asked that officers from the engineering 
department be sent along to take observations.  Lieutenant Emory and two 
assistants were appointed for this end of the expedition. They followed the old 
trail between the mouth of the Gila and San Diego. Some captured Mexicans 
informed them the waters of the lake some 30 or 40 miles away were too salty to 
use, but because other information did not tally with this statement they 
disbelieved it, and continued on their way. They found it even worse than the 
Mexican had said, and searching parties were sent out to locate a running stream 
which they said they had found a league west. Lieutenant Emory's reports were 
complete and detailed - he speaks, for instance, of reaching "an immense level 
of clay hard and smooth as a bowling green," which it is quite likely was the 
present site of the City of Imperial. He also noted the shells in the desert, 
and Captain A. A. Johnson, who was with him, was probably the first to realize 
that the desert was the bed of a departed body of water, for he wrote: "At a not 
distant day this place which is now a dry desert was a permanent lake." They 
make no mention of the fact that the desert was below the sea level, which is a 
surprising oversight considering the completeness of their notes.
            Kearny's party reached San Diego early in 1847 and engaged with the 
Mexicans there and later at Los Angeles, where the American flag was planted to 
stay.
            Kearny's party was followed by another; a company of Mormons 
expelled from Nauvoo, Illinois, were formed into a company consisting of 500 men 
of all ages, under Captain St. George Cook, known as the "Mormon Battalion." 
After many and extreme hardships, and hampered by a wagon train, for which they 
were obliged to hew the rocks to make a path wide enough to let them through the 
canyon at San Felipe, they reached Los Angeles. 
            The Mexican war resulted in the seizure of California and New Mexico 
and the purchase of Arizona. The treaties of Guadeloupe Hidalgo and the Gadsen 
Purchase stipulated that the boundary line between Mexico and the United States 
should be jointly explored and run, and in 1850 to 1853 John Russell Bartlett 
and assistants did the work for the United States and the route they followed 
was from San Diego to Yuma by way of San Pasqual (Warner's ranch) and San 
Felipe, thence by Cameron Lake to the Colorado River.
             Some time before gold was discovered in California a General 
Anderson of Tennessee went from Tucson to California, and on reaching the 
Colorado built a ferry boat to transport his party and equipment. Afterward he 
gave this boat to the Yuma Indians with a certificate by which they held 
possession as long as they would ferry Americans across the river at the rate of 
one dollar per man, one for his horse or mule and one for his pack, but would 
forfeit it when they failed to keep this rate. The Indians were faithful to this 
contract and for some time operated the ferry at the lower crossing, some four 
or five miles below Yuma. But with the rush of adventurers to the gold fields 
the white men looked with covetous eye on a business they knew would prove a 
gold mine itself, and this caused the first trouble with the Indians. Dr. 
Lincoln, said to be a relative of President Lincoln, seeing the possibilities of 
the ferry run by an American and not wishing to interfere with the Indians, 
established one at the junction of the Gila and the Colorado. It proved very 
profitable, and he had a number of men working for him. One of them, a man named 
Glanton, quickly acquired a dominating influence in the business. Until his 
advent there had been no conflict between the Indians and Dr. Lincoln, but 
Glanton determined to drive the Indians out of business, and is said to have 
destroyed the Indians' boat and murdered a white man working for them. This 
treatment infuriated the natives, who never had been very friendly to the 
whites, and it resulted in the murder of the white men at the ferry and the 
determination on the part of the Indians to kill every American they met. As a 
large party of immigrants was expected shortly, Governor Burnett, for their 
protection and the punishment of the Yumas, ordered the sheriff of San Diego to 
enroll 20 men, and the sheriff of Los Angeles 40, to be placed under the command 
of General Bean of the State militia and proceed at once to the scene of the 
trouble. General Bean placed the command in the hands of General Moorhead, but 
the expedition did no good whatever, but sent in a tremendous expense account, 
so in the following November Fort Yuma was established for the protection of 
that part of the country, and Major Heintzel was put in command. Under his 
authority a party left San Diego in May,1850, fully equipped  to build and run 
boats at Lincoln's ferry. After a few years of successful operation, the ferry 
line was sold to Diego Yeager, who made a fortune out of it before the building 
of the Southern Pacific Railway, after which it ceased to be so profitable. 
           Another expedition of military engineers, sent out to investigate 
possible railroad routes to the coast, passed over the desert in 1853 under 
Lieutenant R. S. Williamson, and Professor William Blake was appointed geologist 
of the party. His reports are both complete and very interesting. 
           In 1855 Congress appropriated money to buy camels for transportation 
purposes across the desert, it being necessary in some way to reduce the time, 
labor and discomfort of desert travel; and two different herds were purchased, 
one in 1856 and another in 1857. In some respects they were very satisfactory; 
but a camel needs to be handled by men who understand it, and when the officers 
who did were transferred and the new men in charge neither understood nor cared 
to learn, complications ensued which resulted in the abandonment of the camel 
scheme, and the sale of the animals, save a few which escaped to the desert.
OLD STAGE ROUTES
 
              As a preliminary to the building of the railroads, various stage 
lines were run. One called the San Antonio and San Diego. Semi-monthly stages 
ran for about a year. Then the historic Butterfield  Stage Coach Line was 
started. It ran semi-weekly, and had a six years' contract with the government 
for carrying mails, at $600,000 per year. The route lay between St. Louis and 
San Francisco, and was covered in from twenty to twenty-two days, although it is 
said to have made the trip in sixteen upon occasion. There were three stations 
upon this line, at Coyote Springs, Indian Wells, and at the east side chain of 
sand hills. 
            The mail service of the Butterfield stage was not the first that 
California had. As early as the time when Benjamin Franklin was appointed 
postmaster general for the colonies, there were monthly mail trips between 
Monterey in Upper California, and Loreto, at the end of Lower California. They 
even had a franking system in full force, which was seemingly as much abused in 
those days as in our own.
              The California mail system was not only four hundred miles longer 
than the continental one on the eastern coast, but it made better time, which is 
a surprise to those of us who are in the habit of considering California and its 
institutions as new and rather undeveloped. 
              Northern California had a number of stage routes beside the 
Butterfield - the first in Southern California was Gregory's Great Atlantic and 
Pacific Express. It brought the eastern mail down from San Francisco. The first 
overland stage by a southern route started from San Antonio, Texas and followed 
the extreme southern route through New Mexico and Arizona to California. Owing 
to Indian outrages this route was abandoned. The Butterfield route was the 
largest and best organized of all the stage routes, but it suffered so much loss 
through the Civil war that it was abandoned. The last stage company was Wells 
Fargo & Company, which was established in 1868.
              The same year that the Butterfield stage line was established, Dr. 
Oliver Wozencraft began to agitate the question of bringing the waters of the 
Colorado River into the Salton Sink for irrigation purposes. Many people less 
informed on the subject of irrigation than he regarded him as a dreamer, but 
nevertheless his project might have gone through but for the breaking out of the 
Civil War. In 1859 a bill was passed by the California State Legislature which 
ceded to Dr. Wozencraft and associates about 1600 square miles of desert land in 
consideration of a water supply being introduced. The reclamation must begin in 
two years and be finished in ten, and as fast as it was introduced the 
government was to issue patents for the land reclaimed; the title to be granted 
when all conditions were filled. But the Civil War stopped proceedings. After 
the war, Dr. Wozencraft again endeavored to bring the matter up, but died 
suddenly in Washington just as it was about to come up for another hearing. He 
sacrificed his entire property to this project of reclamation.
              In 1881 to 1884 the tracks of the Southern Pacific were laid 
following the main survey of the government in 1853. Those who complain of the 
fatigue and dust of the trip across the desert in the comfortable Pullman of 
today should read the diaries of those pioneers of western progress and learn 
what discomfort in traveling really is. The completion of the Southern Pacific 
Railroad closed the first part of the story of the Colorado Desert.
              In 1883 the New Liverpool Salt Company filed on some land and 
leased more from the Southern Pacific and began to recover the layers of salt 
which covered the bottom of the Salton Basin - now the Salton Sea. They scraped 
the salt in heaps with steam plows and then purified it. This company made a 
great deal of money until the overflow which in 1906 destroyed the whole plant.
EARLY SETTLERS IN THE VALLEY 
  
             P. J. Storms was one of the first permanent settlers in the Valley; 
he came just after the annual overflow of the river and saw the land covered 
with grass, and thousands of head of stock grazing.
             In the valley were Andy Elliott, Tom McKane, Fred Web, Nat Willard, 
Bruce Casebier, Bert McKane, Wash Lawrence, Arthur Ewens, Thomas Silsbee and 
Charles Hook. The Valley then had one voting precinct with ten voters on the 
list: P. J. Storms, Arthur Ewens, A. J. Elliott, Fred Hall, William Huitt, W. 
Wilkins, Thomas Silsbee, A. N. Jones, William Harris and Peter Larson. It was 
still part of San Diego County and they were 140 miles by stage and 300 miles by 
rail from the county seat, and as a result the election supplies did not arrive 
for the first election until it was over.
             In October, 1900, the Imperial Land Company started the towns of 
Imperial, Brawley, Calexico, Heber and Silsbee. Imperial was located in the 
center of the irrigable district, and was intended to be the chief city of 
Imperial Valley, Calexico on the international line, Silsbee to the southwest, 
Brawley north, and Heber to the south; afterward Holtville and El Centro was 
added to the list.
             The first store in Imperial was for general merchandise and was 
built and stocked by Dr. Heffernan, and Millard Hudson erected a tent hotel. The 
next year was built the Christian Church and a printing office. They were the 
only wooden buildings in the Imperial Valley until late in 1901. As the 
accommodations improved the stream of land seekers increased. W. F. Holt built a 
telephone line from Imperial to Flowing Well telegraph station. The Imperial 
Press, Henry Reed, editor, was the first paper. The first child born was a son 
of Tom Beach, superintendent of construction of canals. Most of the necessities 
used by the settlers in the early days was brought in by the freighter with a 
long string of mules, but the mule is being displaced by the automobile and 
traction engine, and one of the picturesque effects of the country is fast 
disappearing.
             In May of that year (1891) a post office was given to Imperial with 
Dr. Heffernan as postmaster, and in the fall a public school was organized by 
Professor J. E. Carr from Nevada City. This school was to serve for the entire 
district and was located in the center of the population, which was about 10 
miles south of Imperial City on the bank of the main canal. The night before the 
school was to open Professor Carr tool two men and drove to the location in a 
wagon and sent up a tent, and next to it they built the school house of arrow 
weed, with eight supporting poles and the next day this sheltered 50 pupils, 
many of whom later walked five miles every day. In the following spring the 
district was divided and permanent buildings erected.
            In April, 1902, the Imperial Land Company invited the Southern 
California Editorial Association to make an excursion to the Imperial Valley, 
and they were so well treated that they felt very friendly to the Valley and the 
publicity they gave to the work of development brought a great many settlers.
            In 1902 the government put out "Circular No. 9," a so-called soil 
expert's report on the soil of the Valley which had been eagerly watched for 
both by the settlers and prospective settlers. He proved conclusively, to his 
own satisfaction, that the land was too full of alkali to grow anything. It did 
not leave the settlers a ray of hope. Many newspapers gave publicity to the 
pamphlet and featured it. One editor, Isaac Frazier of the Oceanside Blade, 
treated the thing as a joke and with some others refused to take the government 
expert seriously. There is no doubt but the report did a great deal of damage to 
the community, beside injuring the credit of the California Development Company. 
Dissensions arising in the company itself, the Chaffeys withdrew from the 
enterprise. Time has disproved the report of the government's inexperienced 
expert, and the settlers have gone on raising all sorts of things that were said 
to be impossible. 
             In 1902 the first Farmers Institute was held in the new brick block 
of the Imperial Land Company. In August they gave a big watermelon festival 
where 250 people feasted. In fact the year 1902 witnessed the birth of many 
business enterprises and a rapid growth of construction and settlement. Water 
was turned into the main canal in March, 1902.