29G 



THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



ELEVENTH NATIONAL IRRIGATION CONGRESS. 



ITS SCOPE AND PURPOSE. 



Origin of the "Congress" and What It Has Accomplished, 



ITS FUTURE WORK. 



Something over twelve years ago, at Salt Lake City, 

 Utah, there was held a "First National Irrigation Con- 

 gress," the object of 



which was to agi- ^- 



tate the reclama- 

 tion of arid lands 

 through nat i o n a 1 

 aid. The states and 

 territories which re- 

 quired and demand- 

 ed reclamation of 

 their useless, unpro- 

 ductive lands to 

 convert them into 

 happy, productive 

 homes, fit for the 

 habitations of mil- 

 lions of people, 

 were: 



Arizona, Califor- 

 nia, Colorado, Ida- 

 ho, Kansas Monta- 

 na, Nebraska. Neva- 

 da, New Mexico, 

 North Dakota, Ok- 

 lahoma, Oregon, 

 South Dakota, Utah, 

 W a s h i n gton and 

 Wyoming. Texas 

 may very properly 

 be included for its 

 western extremity 

 lies far within the 

 arid region, altho' 

 the greater part of 

 the state is what is 

 known as "subhu- 

 mid," a condition 

 common to North 

 Dakota, South Da- 

 k o t a, Nebraska. 

 Kansas and Okla- 

 homa. 



At the time of 

 the first session of 

 the National Irriga- 

 tion Congress, as 

 above mentioned, 

 there were only 66,- 

 9C5 acres of irrigat- 

 ed land in the 

 states classed as 

 "subhumid," a very 

 small proportion of 

 the total surface 

 acreage of those 

 states, which 



amounts to 392,220,800 acres. At the same period 

 the total irrigated area in all of the states classed as 

 "arid," was only 3,5(>4,416 acres, out of 17,199,925 



OFFICERS OF ELEVENTH NATIONAL IRRIGATION 

 CONGRESS. 



Hon. W. A. CLARK. Butte. Montana, 



President. 

 Hon. L. BRADFORD PRINCE, Santa Fe, N. 



First Vice-President. 

 E. H. LIBBY. Clarkson, Wash., 

 Third Vice-President. 



acres of farm or agricultural holdings, or 20.72 per 

 cent of the total area of the farms which were par- 

 ti ully irrigated. But, in these eleven states and ter- 

 ritories, less than one-half of the farms contained irri- 

 gated areas, the total farm area being 40,278,844 acres, 

 the percentage of irrigated acres therefore being only 

 8.85 per cent of the land owned by farmers. The total 

 area of these eleven arid states being 715,187 200 acres, 

 it will be perceived that not only the irrigated acre- 

 age, but the entire amount of farm holdings, when 



the National Irri- 

 gation Congress be- 

 gan its work, were 

 very small spots on 

 the landscape. 



The Congress un- 

 dertook the work of 

 empire building ; 

 that is what it 

 must be credited 

 with, and it fore- 

 saw that the time 

 would soon come 

 when water for ir- 

 rigation purposes 

 would be an im- 

 perative necessity 

 or else the coloniza- 

 tion of the arid 

 states would cease. 

 It was a significant 

 fact, so declared by 

 Government offi- 

 cials who made a 

 detailed examina- 

 tion of all the irri- 

 gated localities, 

 that, as a rule, the 

 greater part, if not 

 all, of the easily 

 available wtor sup- 

 ply had been util- 

 ized, which meant, 

 practically, that 

 private capital was 

 inadequate to sup- 

 ply the deficiency, 

 although there were 

 oceans of water to 

 be had for the 

 ditching of it, or by 

 storing it in reser- 

 voirs. The time 

 had arrived when 

 the aid of the Na- 

 tional Government 

 was necessary to 

 solve the difficulty, 

 and provide means 

 for reclaiming the 

 vast territory that 

 needed only water 

 to make it blossom 

 like a rose garden, 

 and provide homes 

 for millions. It was impossible for State Legislatures 

 to accomplish any results beyond the several State 

 boundaries, and an irrepressible conflict of irrigation 



Hon. F. J. KIESEL, Ogd. n. Utah, 



Chairman Executive Committee. 



ADDI-ON J. McCUNE Colorado, 



Second Vice-President. 



H. B. MAXSON, Reno. Nevada, 

 Secretary. 



