MAJOR POWELL AND HIS WORK. 



237 



states and territories, the area surveyed to date, and 

 the scale and contour interval of the map sheets. 



Thus it will be seen that out of a total area of 1,118,- 

 355 square miles, 209,275 square miles, or nineteen per 

 cent, have been surveyed. In addition to this nearly 

 all of Utah had been surveyed by Major Powell prior 

 to the commencement of work by the Geological 

 Survey, and most of Colorado and large areas of 

 other states and territories had been surveyed by 

 other organizations, although these maps are on 

 smaller scales and are of much inferior quality to 

 those now being made by the Geological Survey, and 

 are of course of very much less value to irrigation 

 enterprises. 



PROGRESS OF IRRIGATION. 



Major Powell was probably the first man to call 

 public attention by writings or lectures to the subject 

 of the reclamation of the lands of the arid West by 

 irrigation. As early as 1867, when he made his first 

 trip to the West with a class of college students, he 

 commenced the study of the problems which arid 

 lands present. Prior to that time he had been a 

 careful student and a college lecturer on physical 

 geography, and in this connection he had considered 

 and discussed the relation of lands to water supply, 

 and had shown how the physical geography of cer- 

 tain countries was such as to enable people to carry 

 on the pursuits of agriculture by means of the arti- 

 ficial watering of land. After his return from this 

 first trip to Colorado, he commenced and has con- 

 tinued ever since to lecture both as a college pro- 

 fessor and in public all over the country on the sub- 

 ject of the arid lands and their irrigation. During 

 his various trips to Colorado, Utah, Arizona and 

 Wyoming in charge of topographic and geologic sur- 

 veys in 1868, '69 and the early '70's, he gauged the 

 various streams in Utah and made a careful study of 

 their capacities for water supply for irrigation. In 

 1878 he wrote his celebrated " Lands of the Arid 

 Region,' 1 which was the first public document in 

 which the subject of irrigation was broadly consid- 

 ered for the whole country. This report is practi- 



cally the foundation work of all the irrigation 

 writings and studies which have followed it. 



In this report he recommended changes in the 

 Land Survey laws, and suggested a re-classification 

 of lands whereby they should be divided into irri- 

 gable, pasture and timber lands, and he has ever 

 since advocated such a system of classification of 

 the arid West. He submitted to Congress, through 

 the Secretary of the Interior, in 1878, two bills, one 

 entitled " A bill to authorize the organization of 

 pasturage districts by homestead settlements of the 

 public lands which are of value for pasturage pur- 

 poses only," and the other " A bill to authorize the 

 organization of irrigation districts by homestead 

 settlements of public lands requiring irrigation for 

 agricultural purposes." 



In 1879 and '80, Major Powell was a member of a 

 commission appointed by Congress on the classifica- 

 tion and codification of the existing laws relating to 

 the survey and disposal of the public domain. The 

 other members of this commission were James A. 

 Williams, Commissioner of the Land Office ; Clarence 

 King, United States Geologist ; A. T. Britton, lawyer, 

 of Washington, D. C.; Thomas Donaldson ; C. E. 

 Dutton, captain, U. S. Army. The results of the labors 

 of this commission were published in four large vol- 

 umes, and recommended to Congress changes in the 

 method of land survey and classification. These 

 changes would have been of the greatest benefit to 

 the country, but it has been found as yet impossible 

 to realize them, though efforts are still being made in 

 Congress to that end. 



Major Powell's writings on the subject of irrigation 

 are probably more numerous, various and valuable 

 than those of any other individual in this country, 

 while he has lectured and given addresses before 

 congressional committees, chambers of commerce 

 and in public, which have wielded the greatest 

 possible influence in the development of the resources 

 of the arid lands. As a direct result of his efforts to 

 attract public attention to the value of the arid lands, 

 Congress finally passed, in 1888, a law creating an 

 Irrigation Survey. The work of this survey con- 

 tinued for two years under the direction of Major 

 Powell, and gave perhaps the greatest direct impetus 

 to the development of the irrigation resources of this 

 country that has resulted from any law or the work 

 of any single public or private act. The reports re- 

 sulting from this irrigation survey have shown 

 clearly and in great detail the extent and value of 

 the water supply of the arid region, and the area and 

 character of the irrigable lands, and they have sug- 

 gested many projects for the reclamation of these 

 lands, some of which have already been inaugurated 

 by private enterprise. 



