THE I |{ R I O A T I N AGE. 



ested Soule, not being dismayed by the fact that the 

 project was abandoned, and knowing that the soil of Gray 

 county is as fertile as any in the world, bided their time 

 until the country should awake to the great importance 

 of irrigated land. Finally, John A. Traylor of the Traylor 

 Machinery Company of Denver, Colorado, became inter- 

 ested and carefully investigated the conditions that were 

 bringing success at Garden City. Thinking he had dis- 

 covered a way to bring success where Soule had made a 

 failure, he interested with him Honorable John Barnett, 

 Attorney General of Colorado, A. M. Eppstein, the well- 

 known Denver millionaire, and S. F. Dutton of the Albany. 

 They organized a company and, securing additional 

 capital, started to work. The canal had been called the 

 Eureka Canal. More than $1,000,000 had been spent on 

 the ditch, but they acquired the ownership of the property 

 from the London, England, bond holders, through Eugene 

 P. Ware, who represented them, and began to carry out 

 their plans. 



Under the ditch are the towns of Ingalls, Cimarron, 

 Dodge City and Spearville. As constructed, the old 

 ditch could have reached 200,000 acres and had a carrying 

 capacity of that much. The ditch broadens out at Ingalls, 

 climbs the divide past Cimarron putting all the rich, val- 

 ley land contiguous to Cimarron, under water. 



Mr. Traylor came to examine the property in January, 

 1909, and made a report on it as engineer and a few months 

 later bought it, interesting with him the above named 

 gentlemen. Instead of tapping the river, which had been 

 tried before, he proposed to them the question of recover- 

 ing the underflow of the Arkansas River first and after- 

 ward to store the flood water of the Arkansas in reser- 

 voirs. 



Sites for such reservoirs are available at various 

 points. The result of his study showed that underlying 

 the Arkansas River proper as far as the Kansas-Colorado 

 line is a water bearing zone principally of coarse gravel 

 reaching fifty feet in depth at Coolidge on the Kansas- 

 Colorado line. The service of the river has a fall of six 

 feet to the mile at Garden City, and the water bearing 

 zone has a thickness of 300 feet, while fifty miles further 

 east of Dodge City, the thickness is only ninety feet, 

 creating thus a deep pocket at Garden City. By tests, 

 the water bearing zone was found to extend north and 

 south of the river to a varying distance of from five to 

 fifteen miles. The gravel making up the ancient river bed 

 was also found by actual test to hold forty per cent of 

 water. This water flows in a constant current eastward 

 following the main course of the Arkansas River. From 

 the logs of various wells up the valley, it was found that 

 there were small kidneys or islands of clay interspersing 

 the gravel up and down the valley, but by actual borings 

 at a point just west of Ingalls there was found five miles 

 of nothing but gravel. 



The new company incorporated as the Arkansas Val- 

 ley Irrigation Company, started at that point to recover 

 the under-flow. The success of the government wells at 

 Garden City has proven that at least one-fourth of a 

 gallon per square foot of percolating area under one foot 

 head of water can be obtained and be depended upon as 

 a constant flow. This and more has proven to be the 

 fact at Cimarron. In fact a sub-current has been proven 

 to flow as freely but not as rapidly as the current in the 

 bottom of the river. 



As a result of these peculiar conditions ruling at this 

 particular place only, the idea was conceived of construct- 

 ing a sump or gathering channel of such proportions that 

 it might catch all the under-flow flowing down the Ar- 

 kansas Valley which would be sufficient in a normal flow 

 to take care of 30,000 acres of land. At the same time 

 the government records of the water passing Ingalls 

 each year show an average of 1,000,000 acre feet of water 

 going to waste annually. 



Right here it is well to note the apparently impossible 

 fact that about four times as much water is taken put of 

 the Arkansas River now every year and used for irriga- 

 tion as flows at any place in the Arkansas at any time. 

 This is of course because of the fact that it nearly all 

 seeps back into the channel again. 



The construction company subsequently filed on the 

 water rights and is now constructing reservoirs of suf- 

 ficient capacity to take care of 50.800 acres extending as 



fas as Spearville forty miles east of the intake of the 

 canal. The difference between this project and others 

 lies in the method of securing the under-flow. Instead of 

 constructing an expensive pumping system, the engineers 

 after the most complete investigations recommended the 

 construction of a sump that would gather and collect the 

 water and feed it to the canal by gravity. This was quite 

 possible as, commencing at the intake of the canal and 

 for a considerable distance up the valley, the river has a 

 straight fall of eight feet to the mile. The canal was con- 

 structed with only a drop of one foot to the mile and runs 

 parallel to the river on the north side distant from the 

 same only a few hundred feet to a point where it approxi- 

 mated eight feet below the level of the river opposite or 

 the local level of water in the valley. At that point the 

 construction of the gathering channel was begun. 



The sump has now been constructed several thousand 

 feet and is producing on an average eight times the 

 amount of water the engineers originally planned to re- 

 ceive. Engineers contend that this shows the beginning 

 of the largest proposition of its kind ever known. One 

 needs to imagine a trench or canal which on its bottom 

 grade has a width of sixty feet standing at all times six 

 feet dee^ in water, with an eighty-foot width on the sur- 

 face, the bottom extended on a level, thereby gaining 

 eight feet in depth per mile length to a total length of five 

 miles, to appreciate this. This sump, therefore, has a 

 width of sixty feet on its bottom at the beginning and 

 gradually reaches a total surface width of 110 feet, being 

 the natural slope for excavation. At the upper end or 

 terminus it will have a width of sixty feet on the bottom 

 and a depth of 58 feet from the surface and a width on 

 the surface of 225 feet. 



This sump has been constructed 3,000 feet so far and 

 is being constructed purely as a water selling corporation 

 with no stock for sale. 



The country is a natural wheat, corn and alfalfa com- 

 munity with eight months of actual growing season and 

 a warm, temperate summer climate. The soil may be 

 classed as alluvial, being made up wholly by successive 

 deposits from the Arkansas River. A sand and gravel 

 bed extends both north and south holding almost on a 

 level with the channel of the river. Above this lies the 

 rich, loamy soils of Gray and Ford counties on the north 

 side of the river. The soil varies from ten to 100 feet in 

 depth and is almost wholly gypsum in one form or another. 

 No alkali or indications of alkali are found anywhere. 



At this time the old canal is cleaned and has water 

 flowing in it to within three miles of Dodge City, and the 

 scraper gangs are commencing the work for completion of 

 the canal to a few miles east of Dodge City. No water 

 is offered except as developed. A perpetual water right 

 entitling the holder to sufficient water costs $40 on twenty- 

 year terms. Lands can be bought under this system at a 

 reasonable price, depending upon their location and near- 

 ness at present to Cimarron. 



Alfalfa has been proven to produce eight tons to the 

 acre, grain sixty to ninety bushels to the acre; wheat from 

 forty to sixty bushels per acre. The future of Cimarron 

 lies not only in these crops but in truck farming. Cimar- 

 ron is on the main line of the ditch. The town is located 

 on the main line of the Santa Fe Railroad with eight 

 trains per day stopping there. The altitude is 2,400 feet. 

 It possesses two grain elevators. The cattle ranches suc- 

 cumbed to farming six or seven years ago. 



Cimarron itself is now thirty years old and has about 

 1,000 population, the majority of which have arrived 

 within the last few years. The place is naturally prepared 

 for a rapid growth to meet the influx of settlers, land 

 buyers and business men who will be attracted by the 

 unusual opportunity. It is just 375 miles to the market 

 centers of Kansas City or in the opposite direction. Den- 

 ver. 



A new commercial club has been organized at Cimar- 

 ron with C. R. Rixon as president, and E. T. Peterson as 

 secretary, and preparations are being made to meet the 

 new and altered conditions which will soon prevail. 



There is so much interest about this unusual proposi- 

 tion and about Cimarron itself that this article will be 

 continued from time to time covering the whole subject 

 in detail. 





