The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1905-12-13
GOLORADO'S QUEER COURSE
EXTRAORDINARY ANTICS OF A
GREAT WESTERN RIVER.
uos Gradually Built Banks on Each
side of Gulf of California. Almost
Human in Its Behavior.

eide OF AIuHA IA S6AAAAOA hAS~s ~~AAA~N0S
Human in It's Behavior.
.tThere is something almost human
in the way the Colorado river has been
1obaving.' remarked f. Fl. Newell,
tho chief photographer of the geologi-
cal survey, on his return from an ex-
+onsive trip through the west, says the
washington correspondent of the Bos-
con Transcript. ''This stream, rising
in Wyoming, has drainage area OF
,,oarly one-tenth of the United States,
ond cuts in it's course the deepest can
vons on the face of the earth. From
tho solid rocks where it has made them,
.brough hundreds of miles, it has TAX
On material down to the Gulf OF Cal1tor-
MIA. and by slight but regular annual
overAows gradually built banks on
each side out into that gulf. These, in
time. cut off the head of the gulf, leav-
inc drv a depression in southern Cali
fornia considerably below sea level,
known as the Salton Sink For miles
Of its Journey the Southern Pacific
Railroad runs below sea level. A
privately owned irrigation enterprise,
on the Mexican side of the line, cut
cash into this bank of the Colorado
which nature has been forming. The
high waters came and man lost control
of his artificial channel, with the result
that the river thought best to pour its
waters back into the depression which
had once been a part of the Gulf OF
California. To get the river to re-
sumo it's own course is no small task,
and with it the Southern Pacific Rail-
road evidently purposes to grapple
heroically.
Forming a Great Salt Lake
1.-THE river is now pouring down a
steep declivity, into this basin; which
is 200 feet or more below the sea level.
If this were allowed to continue, it
would make a great salt lake in south
ern California. This water has al
ready risien to the point where it has
submerged big salt works and fifteen
miles of the Southern Pacific's over
land track, forcing that company to
build around the rising sea, and unless
its engineers succeed in routing the
Colorado for it's old destination it
will be necessary to rebuild a much
longer piece of that road. Some peo-
pie have argued that such sea would
affect favorably the climate OF south
ern California, but they forget that the
great Gulf of California, jutting into
the most barren regions of the United
States and Mexico, seemingly has had
no good effect on the climate of either.
The Salton sea would add only two
per cent of water surface to that part
of the country, and so hardly would
do what the Gulf of California has
not accomplished. Unless the break
is restored the river will pour into
this basin, forming a very shallow
lake, which would be almost a frying
pan under that semi-tropical sun. Thls
would continue to rise until evapora-
ton balanced the river flow, and then
would fuctuate with the seasons of the
year, shrinking in area during the
season of the heaviest evaporation
and slightest inflow.
The cash in the river bank was cut
by Mexican corporation on that side
of the International line, but the water
is delivered to a number of American
corporations, so that to-day several
are concerned in the affair. 1t is I'M
'derstood that the Southern Pacific,
when the river reaches its lowest stage,
will put in a great force of men In an
endeavor to get the river back to It's
former course. One great difficulty
comes in the sugar-like material which
has been eroded, in which it is extreme
ly hard to insert any permanent struc-
.ture. A pile one hundred feet deep
will be driven into it, and almost as
soon the water, working in under IT,
Will lift it out.