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THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



PERSONALS. 



C. E. STEVENSON, the well-known irrigation engi- 

 neer of Boise, Idaho, is going to Fresno, Wash., to 

 make that place his home. 



* MR. JAS. T. TAYLOR has resigned his position as 

 engineer of the Riverside (Cal.) Construction Com- 

 pany to accept the position of engineer to the Colton 

 Water Company. 



W. D. ARNOTT, who made an excellent reputation 

 as an irrigation engineer in the West during the last 

 twenty years, has finished his work with the Boise 

 Nampa Company and is now busy with a new sys- 

 tem of ditches near Walters Ferry, Idaho. 



A CORRECTION. In the editorial study of the Tur- 

 lock-Modesto works it is stated that the original 

 plans were made by Col. Mendenhall and that Wm. 

 McKay had been the constructing engineer from the 

 beginning. A letter received from Eugene H. Bar- 

 ton, of San Francisco, explains that he was the origi- 

 nal designer of the dam and had charge of the con- 

 struction until the dam reached the height of 68 feet, 

 his plans and specifications being, however, followed 

 until the completion of the work. 



VALUE OF WATER POWERS. 



The theory of the modern engineer, as was out- 

 lined by Ferris in an interview some months ago, is 

 that as the fuel of the earth becomes more and more 

 exhausted, men will turn more and more to the water 

 power of the earth to obtain power for the world's 

 use, and as the cost of transmission, or at least the 

 loss through transmission, has within the last eight- 

 een months been reduced more than 50 per cent., 

 the belief is that in a little while the matter of dis- 

 tance will not very much count, and so wherever 

 there is a waterfall there will likewise be the apparatus 

 to put that fall to work and make it supply men with 

 the power they need to carry on their works. Con- 

 sidering that it is only ten years since the first electric 

 motor was put to work, it is not impossible to suppose 

 that in twenty years one stream after another will be 

 levied upon to supply the power to carry on the in- 

 ter-continental commerce of this country, to haul the 

 cars, to turn the wheels and the looms, and make a 

 new agent man's chief servant in the hauling of com- 

 merce. 



CEDING THE LANDS. 



Senator Carey, of Wyoming, has introduced a bill 

 providing for the donation of 1,000,000 acres of arid 

 lands by the government to each State in which such 

 lands are situated, the State to reclaim the lands and 

 put them into the hands of actual settlers, as under the 

 homestead laws. He believes that limited cession is 



better than giving the State the whole acreage, as it 

 will prevent waste. The lands, according to Mr. 

 Carey's bill, are to be reclaimed within six years, and 

 not more than 800,000 acres are to be set over to the 

 States in any one year. All lands, exclusive of tim- 

 ber and mineral lands, which will not, without irriga- 

 tion, produce some agricultural crop, shall be deemed 

 arid lands under the provision of the hill. 



The states affected by this bill are Colorado, Ne- 

 vada, Idaho, Montana, California, Oregon, Washing- 

 ton, North Dakota, South Dakota, and the Territories 

 of Arizona, Utah and New Mexico. 



IN CALIFORNIA. 



After several years of litigation, the San Joaquin 

 Land and Water Company of Stockton, this State, re- 

 cently elected a new board of directors, and will pro- 

 ceed with the great work of bringing water from the 

 Stanislaus river. 



The new board of directors is composed of Colonel 

 G. B. Sperry, W. C. White, Charles fielding, R. E. 

 Wilhort, J. R. W. Hitchcock of the new forces, and 

 N. S. Harrold, H. O. Southworth, H. W. Cowell and 

 A. M. D. Mclntosh of the old crowd. 



The company owns valuable water rights near 

 Knight's Ferry, and has expended $207,000 in the 

 works, having a dam, several tunnels and a long line 

 of canal nearly completed. The estimated cost of 

 completing the work will be $400,000, and the canals 

 will carry water to 150,000 acres. 



AN IRRIGATION DISTRICT FOR COLORADO. 



Something similar to the Wright irrigating law of 

 California is asked for by William Mathews, irriga- 

 tion superintendent for the district taking water from 

 the Arkansas river. He wants the formation of a 

 district incorporation legalized by the legislature, by 

 which bonds can be issued and the Twin lakes and 

 other reservoirs built and equipped so that the water 

 that goes to waste in June, July and the winter 

 months may be saved. According to Major Powell's 

 measurements, the average flow of the Arkansas river 

 is 2,778 cubic feet a second in May, 4,523 in June, 

 2,528 in July, 1,599 in August and 1,250 in September. 

 The capacity of the ditches already in operation is 

 about 1,700 cubic feet, while those proposed, if in 

 operation, would run the total to 10,995 feet for which 

 Mr. Mathews figures out a supply that can be de- 

 pended on of 1,560 cubic feet. 



IT IS WORTH WHILE 



Writing to the U. S. Experiment Station, Washing- 

 ton, D. C., for list of seeds distributed to farmers in 

 the arid region. 



