The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1896-11-27
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A QUEER WESTERN OASIS.
How the Artesian Wells Are Sup
piled That Water 1t.


Artesian wells are usually expensive
luxuries, but there is one spot on the
American continent where they are
cheaper than pumps and more common
than mortgages. This is in the center
of what used to be called the great
American desert. The boundary of the
oasis forms an ellipse, one focus of
which is at Wilburn, Kan, and the
other at Meade. a winding stream,
called appropriately Crooked creek,
forms the long axis OF the elilpse-
This little lOZenge-shaped district, ly-
ing in the arid forehead of the west,
is probably the best watered portion
of the earths land surface.
A farmer here may have an artesian
we'll in his back yard, another at his
barn, and dozen more in different
places on his farm, says Lawrence
(Kan.) correspondent in the New York
Tribune. All he has to do is TO bore a
hole Is or 20 feet deep and stand to one
side. The water comes quickly bub-
bling up and runs busily away to
quench the thirst of Crooked creek.
No we'll in the whole district cost above
$50, but all are satisfactory.
There are upward of $50 wells in the
narrow basin, yet only few of them
are intelligently managed. There are
three or four wells which yield IS gal
Ions of water a minute, from Il to 20
that yield so gallons, and the rest
grade on down to or 10 gallons. 1t is
computed that enough water flows from
the ground each year to cover 1900
acres of land one foot deep.
The residents, however, are not or
ganized, and have never heard of the
question, How can 1 use what 1
have?" Therefore, they waste the
water shamefully, and the district, ia
stead of being a garden of perennial
beauty and prosperity, is chiefly re-
markable for the sizezof it's mosquitoes
and the hoarseness of its frogs. Here
and there q more progressive farmer
has drained his quagmires and shown
what he can do with these blessings of
nature.
From the time when students first
turned their attention to it, this spot
has been a puzzle The people who
live there imagine they have only
thin crust of earth beneath their fee
and a vast underground lake, that the
land rests upon this lake as ice does
upon water, and that well bored into
its bosom allows the water to rise just
as it comes up through cracks in the
ice But deep borings have proved
that the lake does not exist.
The state geological survey has about
settled the question, and, after all, IL
Is q very SlIuplS OIl6 IL lie llOOi VI Gil
the western territory is made up of de-
posts of that age called by biologists
the cretaceous. Above this, however, is
a wholly different formation, the terti-
airy deposit. 1t consists of loose ma
terial-shale, clay, sand sOil-varying
in depth from 50 to 80 feet. This forms
the surface of the land and is spread
over the area evenly without respect
to the under formations 1t appears
to have been put on like suit of
clothes to warm the bones of naked
old Nature.
The water. fallen as rain ali over the
Rocky mountain slope, sinks through
this loose crust until it comes to the
cretaceous rocks. Then, finding its
downward course stopped, it follows
the dip of the strata and flows gently
eastward upon it's cretaceous bed be-
meath its tertiary coverlet. Wherever
a stream has cut its channel down
nearly to the floor, enormous springs
are continually to be found, and this in
the dryest region, not an actual des
ert on the globe.
The artesian district, then, is easily
accounted for. By some combination of
circumstances the earths surface has
been worn away in the narrow valley
of Crooked creek, almost to the floor
of the country. and the water flowing
slowly along the highlands of the
west energies here for a brief peep at
the day, and then passes on beneath
the eastern hills.