THE HISTORY OF IRRIGATION 



455 



the far West a place where their people could settle. On 

 July 24, 1847, this party of pioneers entered the Great 

 Salt Lake Valley, chosen as the place of settlement, and 

 on that day planted potatoes hi what is now the business 

 section of Salt Lake City, and gave the soil a "good 

 soaking" of water brought from the neighboring City 

 Creek through a plow furrow that served as a ditch. 

 This was the birth of modern irrigation in America. 



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FIG. 171. Caravan crossing the plains in early irrigation days. 



The Mormon pioneers possess the honor of having 

 founded modern irrigation in America, not because of the 

 initial irrigation on July 24, 1847, but because the Mormon 

 people continued the work, dug extensive canals, brought 

 thousands of acres under irrigation, devised methods of 

 irrigation, established laws, rules and usages for the 

 government of populous settlements living "under the 

 ditch," hi short, because they developed permanent 

 irrigation agriculture on a community scale, under the 



