The Norfolk weekly news., 1900-11-15
The Irrigation Question.

The matter of irrigation and the con.
of the country's water supply |
il one of the important questions CON
fronting the people. Its proper solution
means a great deal to the country, es
pecially of the semi arid districts The
idea of prominent people who have
given it much study is not only to
utilize the water of streams, but to cre
ate immense storage reservoirs or lakes
in which can be retained the surplus
waters that fall during the spring
months to be used during the summer
in irrigating growing crops and orchards.
Not only will this water prove of i'm
mense value during the summer, but the
retention of it during the spring will
prevent or at least mitigate the dangers
of freshets and floods. If instead of
constructing levees and dikes the money
used for this purpose is employed to
build dams that will retain the water in
the hills from which it comes double
purpose will be served.
The congress that is to assemble in
Chicago November 2l-24, is to be an i'm.
portant factor in starting this move.
ment and the west shonld be we'll rep.
resented at itssession Guy E. Mitchell,
secretary of the National Irrigation
association, has this to say in recent
article OH the subject:
The history of levee construction on
the Mississippi river has be al long and
expensive one. The first levee was be-
gun in l7l7, which was, when com.
pleted, one mile long, erected to protect
New Orleans, then mere village. This
levee was four feet high and eighteen
feet across at the top. 1t was not, how
ever, until after Louisiana had been
ceded to the United States that levee
construction was begun on large scale
An enlarged systematic scale. AS the
work progressed up the river and addi
tional basins and bottoms were enclosed
the levees necessarily increased il
height. The average height of the
levees in Louisiana, above New Orleans
is now between twelve and thirteen fee
and this height proved insufficient in th
great flood of 1897. This flood indicate
to the engineers that three or four fee
additional will be required
Millions and millions of dollars hav,
been appropriated by the federal gov
ernment for the building of these levee
and other constructions intended to pro
tect the surrounding country iron
. floods, and millions more must be ap
= propriated by every congress to com
. unless steps are taken to prevent thes
floods. These measures of the govern
ment are merely palliative; they do nc
- go to the root of the evil The iepol
:, of Captain Hiram Chittenden, of tn
;, government engineer corps, however
shows that there is a way to strike q
:. the trouble itself, and largely prever
the floods instead Of trying to enclos
them between banks after they hay
become such.
r, He shows in his official reports tha
IA by the building of a series of gre.
n. storage reservoirs at the headwaters
n, the Missouri, floods can be prevente
in through the diverting of the excess
nt waters into these artificial lakes. SureI
n. this is something for congress to gi,
M its attention to. Here is a practic
al plan, An ounce of prevention is wort
in a pound of cure. Congress will
es ahead appropriating millions evel
he session for flood prevention without
lis question, but it will not appropria
q. the same amount for plan, whicl
i'll according to the government ow
ay engineers, promises far greater result
he OF course, the storing of these reservoi
would mean the reclamation of lar
tracts of land to irrigation but this ne
not worry congress, even its caste
RI members, for the eastern merchant, a
'e- already alive TO the situation, and re
rs, ize that 1.-THE reclamation of the al
'r west would open to them the fine
Of market in the world"