THE IRRIGATION AGE. 



363 



SALT LAKE, HOSTESS CITY FOR THE TWEN- 

 TIETH NATIONAL IRRIGATION CONGRESS. 



By Carl Williams 

 Press Representative, Utah Board of Control. 



Salt Lake, the "Hostess City" for the Twentieth Na- 

 tional Irrigation Congress, will take special pride, on Sep- 

 tember 30, in welcoming the organization' back to the 

 place of its birth for the celebration of its twenty-first 

 birthday. It was at the Utah capital that the first session 

 was held Sepember 15 to September 17, 1891. Although 

 no meeting was held in 1892 and the session of 1901 was 

 also omitted, there have been meetings each year, with 

 these exceptions, and the organization which began in a 

 small way to foster the nation-wide movement for the 

 reclamation of lands has increased in strength and in- 

 fluence steadily. 



Salt Lake, especially fitting as the place for the meet- 

 ing of the Congress on the occasion of its attainment of 

 its "majority," is also well selected inasmuch as the first 

 irrigation work attempted by white men on the American 

 continent was done at Salt Lake and these ditches con- 

 structed by the pioneers who settled the valley of the 

 Great Salt Lake in 1847 watered lands within a few hun- 

 dred yards of the hall in which the business sessions of 

 the Twentieth Congress will be held. ' -. 



Although in many ways the development of Salt Lake 

 City has been along lines that apply generally to the 

 larger cities of the West, there are features of its growth 

 that have been closely allied with the development of 

 irrigation in Utah and surrounding states and these pe- 

 culiarities in themselves are closely allied to the im- 

 portance of the objects for which the National Irrigation 

 Congress was organized and. to which" the organization 

 owes its very existence. Known first as "a trackless and 

 worthless waste,' then' as a" land "of meager .agricultural 

 possibilities; Utah came to ' be known a' few years" ag"o 

 as .a state which depended almost entirely upon' its'~mirieral 

 wealth for its development arid, likewis'e, the advancement 

 of Salt Lake City, depended entirely on .these" mineral 

 'resources. .' Then came a "renewal of activity along" lines 

 promulgated by the National, Irrigation Congress "and 

 Utah, although gaining steadily in ' mineral production, 

 has again entered the column of states which are gen- 

 erally classed as those in. which agriculture is the chief 

 source of wealth. 



It was this condition as foreseen by Wm. Smythe, 

 "Father of the Congress," Hon. Arthur L. Thomas, then 

 territorial governor of Utah, William Nelson .arid other 

 prominent citizens of Utah, that led thefn to plan the or- 

 ganization of the. men who we're making the West into "a 

 body which would have for its "chief object the scientific 

 investigation of methods for the reclamation of laritii 

 by irrigation and the formation of a platform on which 

 the business men of the country who realized the im- 

 portance of this particular line of development might 

 stand effectively. These men, realizing the importance 

 of irrigation to the development of the entire West, 

 realized at the same time that only through co-operative 

 effort could real results be attained with any degree of 

 celerity and they were likewise strongly of the opinion 

 that the citizens of the country east of the Mississippi 

 river could be brought to a realization of the national 

 importance of irrigation only through an organization 

 that should be national in its scope. Discussions of ways 

 and means followed and the call for the first National 

 Irrigation Congress as issued by the territorial governor 

 of Utah followed. 



Salt Lake, the hostess city for the 1912 Congress, 

 was long regarded- as a city of peculiarities and. chiefly 

 noted' as the mecca for a religious people holding 10 

 strange beliefs and- customs. In recent years, -howc\cr, 

 Salt Lake has come to-be known as a thriving metropolis 

 holding a commanding position at the center of a vast 

 territory and growing at a rapid rate to keep up with the 

 commercial demands, not only of the state of Utah but 

 of the entire intermountain region. 



Mining and agriculture have thus worked together 

 in the development of Utah and its capital city and, al- 

 though the balance of power or importance may swing 

 from one side to the other and thus continue the rivalry 

 among those following different branches of industry, the 

 condition now recognized as permanent in Utah is that 

 the continued growth and prosperity of the intermountain 



region is the foundation for the individual growth of Salt 

 Lake City and that the development of irrigation in this 

 region will be the chief factor in the growth of the city 

 for years to come. 



One of the old "peculiarities" of Salt Lake as pointed 

 out to tourists and remarked by thousands was the irri- 

 gation system covering the entire city, utilizing the sides 

 of the streets for ditches. In some parts of the city these 

 mountain brooks are -still -to be seen but most of them 

 have given way to the needs of a greater population ana 

 more systematic and scientific use of the city's water 

 supply. Thus, instead of the picturesque waste of the 

 water from four or five nearby canyons, Salt Lake with 

 its population in excess of 100,000 has an abundant supply 

 of the purest water while utilizing no more than the mini- 

 mum flow of the canyons. Recent steps towards the 

 conservation of flood waters through the development 

 of natural reservoirs in connection with the municipal 

 water works system have in view the future growth of the 

 city rather than present needs. 



Some of the characteristic features of Salt Lake 

 that will be noted by delegates and visitors to the Con- 

 gress are worthy of passing mention. As to the old 

 historic features, including the Mormon temple and Taber- 

 nacle and other spots closely allied with the religion, of 

 .the pioneer settlers of the city, it may be said that they 

 are still spots of interest to the hundreds of thousands 



Presidents of National Irrigation Congress. 



