Wausau pilot. [volume] (Wausau, Wis.) 1896-1940, 1905-07-04
Conquest # IL. Great
American Desert
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No achievement of his administra-
ton gives President Roosevelt more
| thorough satisfaction than what is
termed The Reclamation Law" He
eSteems it one of the wisest and most
beneficial pieces of legislation of recent
years and lis confident that it will pro-
mote the public welfare quite as much
as the Morrill, act, which dedicated a
great part of the public lands to the
education of the people, or the Home
stead Law, which did more than any
other measure to build up the great
West. The Reclamation Law is in
tended without expense to the tax pay
ers, to make the arid regions of the
West capable of cultivation. 1t applies
the proceeds from the sale of public
lands to the construction of irrigation
systems and reservoirs to supply them;
which are TO be sold at cost price on
ten years time to the people who en-
JOY the benefits createI by them. The
money thus refunded is to be used
again and again and still again. in ex-
tending the irrigation system, until ev-
cry acre of the arid regions is watered
and fit for human habitation.
The reclamation fund has grown
very rapidly; much more rapidly than
any advocate of the law expected. Dur
ing the first year about four million
dollars was turned into the treasury.
On the 3Oth Of June, 1904, it amounted
to $11,276, 2S9.S7 and by the end of the
current fiscal year it will reach, if it
does not exceed, fifteen millions.
Surveys have been completed for
thirteen great irrigation projects in as
the reclamation of 1,131,000 acres Of
desert land at a cost of $31, 1895, 900, or
an average Of $27.26 per acre. The
land thus improved will be sold to the
public at that price in ten annual in
stallments and thus the entire amount
of money expended will be refunded
to the government.
The President is also greatly graft
fed at the rapid progress that is being
made by the irrigation bureau. Six of
the projects in the above list have been
begun; contracts have been let, and
thousands of laborers are already en-
ployed in Arizona, Colorado, Idaho,
Nebraska, Nevada and New Mexico.
The other propositions will be under
taken as rapidly as possible.
In Nevada work commenced as ear
ly as September. 1908, in building a
dam in Truckee River to take the
flood waters from the mountains and
the overflow of Lake Tahoe and dump
them into Carson River. Another dam
will be built in Carson River to store
these waters until they are neededsn
the dry season, when they will be dis
tributed by means of canals and ditch
es over an area of about 100000 acres,
mostly desert land belonging to the
government The cost of this improve
ment will be $2,6O0,OOO, or $26 an acre,
and the land improved is now subject
to homestead entry in tracts Of forty,
eighty, 100 or 100 acres, according to
its situation.
The law allows enough land TO each
payments are required; no communal
tons, but the settler must actually
live on it and cultivate it for five years
and pay $3.50 an acre each year for
ten years, when he will receive a title
to the land and own the water rights
without additional payments. Private
land which receives the benefit of the
water must pay at the same rate
$3.50 per acre for ten years. After ten
payments the owner of the land will
have the water rights free of cost for
all eternity. The land is good for al
falfa, sugar beets, potatoes and all the
root crop and fruits Of the temperate
zone. 1t is only twelve hours from
San Francisco by rail, fifty miles from
the capital of Nevada. and is sur
rounded by mining settlements in ev-
cry direction.
Part Of the land reclaimed will be
the old Forty-NIile Desert, or Carson's
Sink, which was a horror of early emf
grants-the worst spot on the over
land trail; and was lined the entire dis
lance with the bones of men and ami
mails. Thousands Of poor creatures
died there from thirst and exhaustion.
Farmers who plow there now turn up
in almost every furrow gun barrels
which were driven into the earth to
mark graves and have since been
buried deep in the drifting sands. As
an illustration of the perversity of
nature, the engineers who have BEN
laying out the proposed irrigation sys-
TEN have found an abundance of cold,
pure water a few feet below the sur
face wherever they have made Dor
ings. All Of this desert will be re-
deemed and when the present PROPOSE
ton is finished the works will be ex-
tended to the Humboldt and Walker
Rivers, which will bring several hun
1red thousand acres more under irri-
cation and make paradise of what is
now the most desolate spot in Nevada.
These rivers carry plenty of water
from the mountains, but it disappears
as soon as it reaches the sand. The
engineers propose to catch it before it
reaches the ''sinks" and store it in
to be tapped when needed,
William e. Curtis.