The Florence tribune., 1899-07-15
WATER WANTED. WHILE BILLIONS OF GALLONS RUN
 TO WASTE. What Recent Government Investigations Disclose in Regard to Irrigation Possibilities in Arizona. Good Indians and industrious White Hen Who Are Practically Destitute
 for Lack of Water. An Exceptionally Favorable Opportunity to Inaugurate the Much talked of System of Federal Irri-
 gation.
From the Los Angeles Times. July lO.l

instance or nearly fifty miles. Here are located the Pima and Marlcopa Indians to the number of nearly five thousand. These Indians are known throughout the Terri tory as good Indians.' They have always been peaceful in their habits, and agricul- tnral or pastoral in their pursuits. They are now cultiyating the lands where the prehistoric races built the now-ruined Casa Grande and its neighboring canals. Irriga- tion has been practiced in this valley from prehistoric times. Many ancient ditches can be traced across the plain, showing evidences of engineering skill and testifying to the fact that large volumes of water were at one time carried.
 The Pimas and Maricopas have been, until recently, a self-sustaining nation. They raise their crops of grain and corn with skill equal to that of the whites. The settlers, seeing he results which the In- dians have produced, through the operation of the desert land act, brought under culti- vation much land in the valley of the Gila, adjacent to this reservation. and have built extensive canals between Florence and the railroad station of Casa Grande. Under the provision of the United States law, all land bought under the desert-land act must be made productive by the application of water. In order to comply with the provis- ions of this law. the settler was compelled to make diversions from the Gila River at points above the Indian reservation. Other lands were taken up under similar condi- tions on the upper portion of the Gila River. These diversions by the whites quickly de- prived the Indians of their water supply, and for the past Eve years they have been left on the desert without water for their crops and scarcely enough for their horses. They are put in the position of either having to steal, starye or be fed as public wards, and the government has been forced to issue rations to them and feed them as 1t does the soldiers. Numerous court decisions have been rendered establishing beyond con troyersy the fact that the Indian has the prior and the better right to the water, but the whites have maintained their water supply despite tho dictates of the court. The development of this newer civilization has'become so extensive that to cut of its water supply would mean the desolation of many thousands of acres of fine farms and orchards. Evidently, the situation is diff cult one. and the Indian Bureau is hard pressed for a proper answer.
 Tn 18e6 an allotment of Ss5O0 was made from the appropriation for the Indian Office for preliminary investigation of the avail able water supply for these Indians. Mir. Newell was instructed to make this investi- gation by the Secretary of the Interior. and he delegated Arthur P. Davis to take the matter up in the field. The surveys were necessarily of a preliminary nature, but the storage possibility of the Gila River was fully demonstrated. It was shown that this stream drained about fifteen thousand square miles of the high plateau and moun- tain region of Eastern Arizona, and that the river Is remarkable for it's exceedingly light grade. Consequently, the storage possibili- ties of the stream are great. Recommenda- tions were made by Mir. Davis calling for further and more accurate surveys, and in the spring of 1898 Congress passed a second appropriation of S200OO for the completion of this investigation. The Photographic de- pertinent of the Geological Survey was again delegated as the proper office to con- duet these surveys.
 The Gila River derives it's source from the White Mountains in western New Mexico
 
 of from ten to twelve thousand feet. At the point where it issues from it's mountainous basin. there are over twelve thousand square miles draining through it's canons, The basin has been extensively explored, and three large reservoir sites located and surveyed. The capacity of these reservoir sites has been determined and filings have been made under the United States laws for their segregation from the public domain. At point known as the Buttes dam 15e feet in height above the bed of the stream will store enough water to cover 174 ,0O0 acres one feet deep, or. as it is technically ex- pressed, TABOO acre feet. dam at this point would be approximately 300 feet long at the bed of the stream and 800 feet at it's crest. At Riverside Ariz., it was found that dam $50 feet long at it's base, and approxi- mately 800 feet long on top will store much greater quantity of water. the surveys at this site being still incomplete. At San Carlos. on the Apache Reservation, the river passes through a narrow gorge 100 feet wide. and dam at this point l5O feet high would be but 200 feet long at the crest. Such a dam would store s61, 900 acres one foot deep.
 Extensive explorations have been made to determine the depth of bed rock at each one of these dam sites. At the Buttes the he'd rock is disappointingly deep, the depths ranging in the center of the channel from 75 to IA feet beneath the surface of the stream. At Riverside the maximum depth on the axis of the dam is approximately seventy five feet. while at San Carlos the depth to bed rock is believed to be substantially less than at either of the other dam sites.
 The records of the flow of the Gila River have been kept at the Buttes for number of years, and the estimates of available water supply are. therefore. based on actual measurements, not on surmise. The ordi- nary flow of this stream is ample to fill the largest. of these reservoirs, and on the driest years of which we have a record 1t has been as great as 200, 900 acre feet.
 "ItwiIl be seen by the above figures that the possibility of storing water on this stream is very great. It is doubtful if it has any equal in this line among all the streams of arid America. The San Carlos dam site, particularly. is one of unusual