Water is King—Here is its Kingdom
This is a history about water—about a river that shapes waterways and lives in the U.S. and Mexico.
Introduction
Welcome. This StoryMap introduces a history of changes that shape and remake California's Imperial Valley.
The following story serves as a prelude to a larger discussion on labor, land use, and changing social relations in the region. With this in mind, the maps below will focus primarily on water as I am particularly interested in how water has become more of a commodity than a right—a discussion informed by this project but fully unpacked in my dissertation work.
The Imperial Valley is located in southernmost California along the US-Mexico border—it is part of the Salton Trough basin's geographic region and has changed remarkably over millennia.
Notably, geologic time has witnessed the Salton Trough gradually transform from the Ancient Gulf of California’s northward extension in the Tertiary period to Lake Cahuilla’s vast expanse during the Pleistocene epoch. Today’s present-day Salton Sea is a mere fraction of the ancient lake. As impressive as these natural events have been, the late twentieth century witnessed the rise of the Anthropocene—significant in scope as a result of intensified human interference.
Understanding how the Imperial Valley exists today requires an analysis of how one of the hottest deserts in North America became an agricultural wellspring. Scroll below to learn more about the making of the Imperial Valley.
StoryMap Outline:
- Environmental History: Changes in the Salton Basin Through Water
- Greening the Desert: Geological Surveys, Development Plans, and Capitalist Ventures
- County of Canals: The Imperial Valley Through Land and Labor
Part 1: Environmental History
The Ancient Gulf
The maps in this section provide a glimpse of changes in what is now the Imperial Valley. By scrolling down, you will find interactive representations of an ancient gulf, periodic floods, and a modern inland lake.
How to interact with the map:
To learn more in this section, use your mouse to click on the changing bodies of water on the map. A pop-up box with content will appear.
Interacting with the map: The image above illustrates an interactive feature on the map. Try it yourself by clicking on the Ancient Gulf of California or subsequent waterways. In addition to this interactive feature, you can expand the map legend by clicking the circular icon at the bottom left corner of the map. To learn more about these bodies of water, please consult this StoryMap's concluding bibliography and suggested readings.
Ancient Gulf to Sea of Cortez
Seven million years ago, present-day Southern California, Western Arizona, & Northern Mexico were underwater. The Ancient Gulf of California extended northwest from the modern Gulf of California (also known as the Sea of Cortez) to the San Gorgonio Pass—just east of Los Angeles. Over geologic time, the basin below the ocean would become the Imperial Valley. For a chronology of explorations surrounding the Colorado River, see the "Chronological historical synopsis of exploration and development of Colorado River Basin" from the Western Water Archives, linked in the bibliography.
Base map of California. [1893] Map. Retrieved from the Library of Congress.
The River's Sediment
Gradually, sediment suspended in the Colorado River would accumulate. The buildup filled the Ancient Gulf of California with sand, silt, mud, and other naturally occurring material.
The Ancient Gulf's Delta Bar
Sediment deposits at the mouth of the River eventually created a delta bar that separated the Ancient Gulf in half. The lower part became the Sea of Cortez & the upper part developed into a saltwater lake.
George Kennan. The Salton Sea: An Account of Harriman's Fight with the Colorado River. (New York: The MacMillan Company, 1917), 8.
Periodic Flooding
After the modern-day Gulf of California was formed, reoccurring snowmelt from the Rocky Mountains and heavy rains would cause the Colorado River to flood. Overflow redirected the Colorado River into the Salton Sink—which is below sea level.
A River Revisits
When the Colorado River route revisited the low-lying basin, a lake would form. Conversely, the lake would dry up when the Colorado changed course away from the basin.
H.T. Cory. The Imperial Valley and the Salton Sink. (San Francisco: John J. Newbegin, 1915), frontispiece.
Ancient Lake Cahuilla
Intermittent changes to the course of the Colorado River resulted in a large freshwater lake in the Salton Basin, named Lake Cahuilla. The ancient lake repeatedly flooded and evaporated over hundreds of thousands of years.
Enriching Salton Basin Soils
The suspended silt and muddy waters traveling through the River settled in the Salton Basin—leaving behind a rich soil on the grounds of what would become the Imperial Valley.
Stories about a large inland lake by indigenous Cahuilla and Tipai peoples corroborate with Spanish explorations of the 17th century. Spanish explorers did not find a lake but did document the stories they encountered.
Ancient Lake's Evaporation
While the ancient lake eventually evaporated by the 17th century, the ancient shoreline is visible to this day on the mountains surrounding the Valley.
Eugene Singer. "Geology of the Imperial Valley California: A Monograph." 1998.
The Salton Sea
Today, the Salton Sea is California's largest inland lake. It is also located amongst one of the lowest elevations on earth.
Since 1905
The Salton Sea was created by a massive flood in 1905. That year, irrigation systems that diverted Colorado River water to the Imperial Valley had ruptured and flooded the dry lake bed. To this day, the lake receives its water from the Colorado River through irrigation runoff.
George Kennan. The Salton Sea: An Account of Harriman's Fight with the Colorado River. (New York: The MacMillan Company, 1917), frontispiece.
Overlapping Layers
With a broad overview of the region, we can draw connections to understand the story that follows.
Take Away Points from Above
- The Ancient Gulf of California extended from the Sea of Cortez to the San Gorgonio Pass, east of Los Angeles.
- Sediment in the Colorado River eventually created a natural barrier—separating the Ancient Gulf in half.
- The Colorado River was unpredictable— flooding and changing course over time.
- When the water evaporated, the sediment left behind rich nutrients in the soil.
- At times, Colorado River floods created a large inland lake known as Lake Cahuilla.
- The Salton Sea is California's largest inland lake, but it covers only a small portion of the ancient lake.
Part 2: Greening the Desert
“The greatest irrigation and colonization project in America is now being developed on the plains bordering the Colorado river..."
- -Imperial Press, 1901
01 / 02
1
Imperial Valley, California
The Imperial Valley is located in southernmost California along the US-Mexico borderlands. The region is part of the Sonoran desert—the hottest desert in North America.
Large-scale agriculture has dominated the region since 1901. At the turn of the twentieth-century, intricate dams and canal systems were constructed to reroute the Colorado River towards a vast expanse of parched desert land. Undeniably, agriculture has shaped all aspects of the Imperial Valley's built and natural environment—from waterways to labor on both sides of the border.
2
Greening the Desert
Proposals to reshape the Colorado River came prior to its burgeoning agricultural economy. In the latter half of the nineteenth-century, a series of geological surveys, development plans, and capitalist ventures unfolded to green the desert into an agricultural wellspring.
In 1853, the U.S. Congress authorized grants to pursue viable railroad routes to the Pacific Coast. A professor on one of the authorized expeditions, Dr. Blake, was the first scientist to document the possibility of irrigating the desert for large-scale agricultural production.
In 1859, Dr. Oliver M. Wozencraft sought to actualize Blake's observations—appealing the State of California to cede 3,000,000 acres of arid land in order to irrigate the desert; he was never granted land.
Thirty years later, the California Irrigation Company formed to deliver Colorado River water to the Salton Sink through aqueducts; the Company went bankrupt by 1893 when it failed to generate enough capital for its vision. That same year, the California Development Company incorporated to recommence the irrigation scheme. In May of 1901, water flowed from the Colorado River to the Imperial Valley through the Company's canals.
Chief among the Imperial Valley's empire builders were land developers, engineers, and newspaper magnates. (Novelists and playwrights also played a role, but that’s a story for another day.)
Various maps are included in the section that follows. Collectively, they help document changes in the desert during the twentieth century.
Part 3: County of Canals
"In the West, water was not simply a resource, it was the fundamental tool for growth during the twentieth century."
- Evan Ward, Border Oasis: Water and the Political Ecology of the Colorado River Delta, 1940–1975
Colonizing the Desert:
20th Century Development on the US-Mexico Borderlands
Artistic renditions of three historical maps are portrayed to the right. Scroll down to view the expansive irrigation projects that made the Imperial Valley.
The Alamo Canal and Imperial Valley's irrigable lands
In 1901, irrigation projects brought reliable sources of water to the desert through the Alamo Canal.
By 1903, water development projects irrigated 50,000 acre-feet of land in the Imperial Valley. (Green area on map.) Earthen irrigation ditches gradually expanded in the following decades.
But what's an acre-foot of water?
One acre-foot of water is enough water to cover one-acre of land, one foot deep. In terms of measurement, one acre-foot contains 326,000 gallons of water. For reference, that’s equivalent to 203,750 flushes on a standard 1.6 gallons-per-flush (gpf) toilet. In other words, it’s a lot of water.
The map to your right is based on a 1903 survey by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation. The green area represents irrigable land and the lines indicate the expanding canal systems that began in Baja California, Mexico and worked their way into the United States via gravitational flow.
Stanley W. Cosby, "The Imperial Valley of California: An Example of Geographic Instability," (PhD Diss., University of Chicago, 1930).
Photograph albums documenting diversion of the Colorado River and creation of the Salton Sea, 1900 -1911. Owning Institution: UCLA, Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library Source: Calisphere.
Imperial Valley Floods
Inundated in the First Decade of Settler Colonialism
The map to the right is based on a US Geological Survey study from 1908. Within a decade, the Imperial Valley's irrigation system had doubled in size and inadvertently flooded the desert basin.
1905-1907 Floods
By 1905, sediment in the Colorado River had built up in the Valley's canal systems—slowing the flow of water to developing farmland. Under pressure from local growers, the irrigation company (CDC) expanded the width of the main dam in Mexico to divert more water to the desert.
However, poorly executed efforts to increase water flow caused a breach in the dam—inundating major portions of Imperial Valley, California and Baja California, Mexico. This quandary hampered the CDC's colonization project for two years as the Colorado River flowed uncontrollably to the Salton Sink—an area below sea level.
In 1907, President Roosevelt's administration intervened. The federal government and Southern Pacific Railroad worked together to close the dam breach and the Imperial Valley soon continued its water development project. Increased irrigated acreage soon followed when the Imperial Irrigation District formed in 1911. Accordingly, canals expanded northward towards the Salton Sea.
Stanley W. Cosby, "The Imperial Valley of California: An Example of Geographic Instability," (PhD Diss., University of Chicago, 1930).
Photograph albums documenting diversion of the Colorado River and creation of the Salton Sea, 1900 -1911. Owning Institution: UCLA, Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library Source: Calisphere.
George Kennan. The Salton Sea: An Account of Harriman's Fight with the Colorado River. (New York: The MacMillan Company, 1917), 58-59.
Imperial Valley Today
The County of Canals
Today, approximately 500,000 acres of the Imperial Valley are irrigated annually by the Colorado River. The All-American Canal is now the main source of water for residential and commercial purposes—it also prevents the Salton Sea from completely drying up.
All-American Canal
The All-American Canal is an 80 mile-long, 200-foot wide aqueduct that was constructed in 1941. In the 1920s, Valley growers lobbied for government funding to secure a water source that did not rely on Mexico—as did the Alamo Canal—for crop production. (See advertisement below. Circa 1926.) The All-American Canal satisfied those demands but impacted Mexico by diverting Colorado River water away from Northern Mexico into Southern California.
"Broadside advertising support for All-American Canal." Broadside, 1 scanned page: Imperial Valley Records, Box 3, Folder 7, Honnold Mudd Library, Special Collections.
"Map of the All-American Canal project." Map, 1 scanned map: Imperial Valley Records, Box 1, Folder 24, Honnold Mudd Library, Special Collections.
“$6,000,000 Awarded for All-American Canal: Announcement by Ickles To Start Big Project,” Imperial Valley Press (El Centro, CA), Oct. 24, 1933.
Jay Calderon and Richard Lui, All-American Canal, 2018, The Desert Sun.
Bureau of Reclamation photo on Lollesgard Specialty Co., Tucson, Arizona. Postcard. Circa 1940.
Labor and Landscape
Searching for the Workers
Digging through special collections and archives, periodicals, and numerous books, I’ve searched for the workers who shaped and were shaped by the Valley's rerouted waterways.
As illustrated through the maps in Part 1, the Colorado River flowed intermittently to the Valley for millions of years—flooding and flowing below sea level. Today, the Valley still receives Colorado River water, but the process is much different—technological advances collect and convey water through an aqueduct. That process involved workers who built the Valley's water system, but they're curiously missing from local history.
They're There: The Workers
Imperial Valley history is generally depicted as a barren wasteland where the conquest of engineers, investors, and scientists—typically white men of means and capital—controlled the waters for development. Too often, though, the manual laborers in that story are invisible.
There are, however, fleeting moments when the workers appear. Albeit nameless and frequently faceless, they’re there. The photograph below offers a glimpse. Captioned as “Typical Indian laborers” in a California Development Company photo album, these workers seldomly (yet occasionally) emerge amongst thousands of archival photographs.
Photograph albums documenting diversion of the Colorado River and creation of the Salton Sea (Collection 94/1). UCLA Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library, University of California, Los Angeles.
Photograph albums documenting diversion of the Colorado River and creation of the Salton Sea (Collection 94/1). UCLA Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library, University of California, Los Angeles.
Photograph albums documenting diversion of the Colorado River and creation of the Salton Sea (Collection 94/1). UCLA Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library, University of California, Los Angeles.
Occluded Labor
The Search Continues
Operating outside the camera’s field of view, the absent laborers are rendered invisible and subsequently separated from their work in reshaping the Imperial Valley. In the process, their involvement, labor conditions, and lives are virtually erased from references that might otherwise tie them to either land or imagery associated with the region.
In exchange for their absence, the archives provide staged photographs of engineers at center stage—standing tall with hands on their hips. That is to say, there are consequences that come with erasure—whether or not an erasure is intentional.
Making Imperial Valley
A Glimpse Towards the Future
In response to and against mainstream depictions of regional history, I aim to locate substance in the ephemeral to better understand how transitory labor and built environments coalesced into the making of the Imperial Valley. To that end, more work needs to be done to foster critical conversations about place making, water politics, and power struggles—dialogue set in the past to inform the present. That conversation, is central to my dissertation research.
Acknowledgements
This project is an ongoing effort to introduce environmental and labor history to a general audience. While it grew slowly from an idea to better visualize events that shaped regional history, it has helped me better understand how water and labor shape the Imperial Valley.
Future updates will include additional information to clarify examples above. The visuals on this StoryMap primarily focus on environmental changes that precede the mid-twentieth century. However, the impacts from mega-farms on Imperial Valley's transnational labor force and environmental health (water + air quality) will encompass future revisions as I advance in my graduate studies.
Redrafts of this project will highlight how built and natural environments, changing social relations and demographics, and agricultural economies precipitated through the onset of water development projects in southernmost California’s Imperial Valley along the US-Mexico borderlands. It will draw connections between environmental health, labor, race, power struggles and resistance. Overall, it will tell a story with the potential to influence public policies for improved environmental health, and a better and more just place in the area I call home.
Support for this project was made possible through a 2019-2020 Mentorship for Digital Humanities Grant from the University of California Humanities Research Institute (UCHRI). My academic advisor, Dr. Sifuentez, is instrumental to this project’s ongoing development—helping guide my research toward a project that centers on peoples’ labor and agency at the confluence of California water history. Special thanks go to my UCHRI Digital Humanities Mentor, Dr. Seed, who shared valuable insight on this project's direction and where it could theoretically flow.
