History of the Los Angeles Aqueduct
A variety of projects, plans, and schemes were proposed to meet the Los Angeles water crisis. William Mulholland constructed the Elysian Reservoir in 1903, just northeast of today’s Dodger Stadium as a stopgap for the “increasing water demands”. Other small reservoirs were built, but at one point, in the summer of 1904, there was less than a two-day supply of water. Desperate farmers started hiring “rainmakers”.
The engineer issued bans on lawn watering, cut off the flow to city fountains and ponds, deployed large numbers of a new device-water meters, and threatened to sue outraged farmers and ranchers who were pumping unlimited amounts of water from the Los Angeles River aquifer in the San Fernando Valley.
A few years later, a bond issue passed to pay for construction of a 233 mile-long Los Angeles aqueduct. Mulholland was hired as Chief Engineer of this controversial 5-year project. Completed in 1913, it diverted massive amounts of water from the Owens River in the eastern Sierra Nevada mountains to Los Angeles. The water table in the Owens Valley was nearly drained by the huge venture, ruining many local farmers, resulting in the California Water Wars.
Former Los Angeles Mayor Frederick Eaton, Los Angeles Times publisher Harrison Otis, and local developer and namesake of the Huntington Library Henry Huntington were among the many wealthy businessmen who quietly bought San Fernando Valley land. Their land investments were triggered by inside knowledge of the aqueduct’s route. Their newly acquired acreage would have greatly enhanced value with water access. The movie “Chinatown” contained fictionalized scenes of some of the chicanery.
The engineer issued bans on lawn watering, cut off the flow to city fountains and ponds, deployed large numbers of a new device-water meters, and threatened to sue outraged farmers and ranchers who were pumping unlimited amounts of water from the Los Angeles River aquifer in the San Fernando Valley.
A few years later, a bond issue passed to pay for construction of a 233 mile-long Los Angeles aqueduct. Mulholland was hired as Chief Engineer of this controversial 5-year project. Completed in 1913, it diverted massive amounts of water from the Owens River in the eastern Sierra Nevada mountains to Los Angeles. The water table in the Owens Valley was nearly drained by the huge venture, ruining many local farmers, resulting in the California Water Wars.
Former Los Angeles Mayor Frederick Eaton, Los Angeles Times publisher Harrison Otis, and local developer and namesake of the Huntington Library Henry Huntington were among the many wealthy businessmen who quietly bought San Fernando Valley land. Their land investments were triggered by inside knowledge of the aqueduct’s route. Their newly acquired acreage would have greatly enhanced value with water access. The movie “Chinatown” contained fictionalized scenes of some of the chicanery.
1912-Workmen standing by a 10-foot diameter pipe section
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1912- 52-mule team transporting
a 30-ton section of steel pipe.
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Thousands of workers, from all over the world, did the grueling work of the aqueduct’s construction at $2.25 a day. Many sections of the steel-plate pipe sections were 10-feet in diameter and crossed several mountain ranges, traveled through tunnels blasted from solid rock and ran across the intense heat of the Mojave Desert.
Nov. 5, 1913-Official opening of Los Angeles Aqueduct. People came in formal attire by car, train and horse-drawn wagons.
This immense project was thought to be the solution for Los Angeles’ future water needs. Mulholland knew better. By the 1920s, he was pushing for the building of an aqueduct and a dam on the Colorado River. This ambitious idea would come to pass in 1939 – four years after Mulholland's death – with the completion of Hoover Dam.
William Mulholland, Los Angeles Aqueduct, Los Angeles Mayor Frederick Eaton