Los Angeles herald., 1907-02-03
AMERICAN DESERT is
tanned BY COMING OF
GREAT INLAND SEA
WONDERFUL RAINS FOLLOW INVASION
Towns Spring Up Where Cacti and Jack Rabbit
Once Reigned-District Prolific with Valu-
able Minerals Opened by Railways
mobiles Supplant Burros

to the camp. Last week / passed
wagons still hauling water to "Orig-
inal," although the mine has become
the producer of thousands of dollars
each year.
other strikes followed In the Bull
frog district. The great Shoshone vein
was opened up A rush was made into
the district and claims were staked out
all over the country.
Towns sprang into being. Some
flourished, others died. One, Bullfrog,
has been absorbed bodily by Rhyolite,
which now boasts three separate water
systems and a railroad, with two rival
lines rushing to complete their tracks
into the district and two light and
power services in process of construc-
ton.
Man had taken the second step to-
ward the tanning of the desert
Nature Aids Enterprise
Then nature stepped in with sur
prise that she had been quietly pre-
pairing for years.
Shut in as the desert country Is by
high ranges of mountains that strip
of their moisture every wind that
crosses them, there was no chance for
the storms from the Pacific to water
the intermountain country.
Two years ago the Colorado river
changed Its course, cut through
channel that had been dry for hum
dreds of years and began to refill with
Its thousands of feet of water the
basin of the long vanished Salton sea.
For two years the waters in the sink
have been rising steadily, and for two
years a short-sighted people have been
making every effort to turn the water
back into the channel from whence it
came.
The attempt has been unsuccessful,
and now in this once barren, season.
less country there Is a fall a spring
and winter-seasons that have never
before been known.
A year ago last summer there was
the first trace of summer rain in the
country south of Tonopah and Gold
field, where Rhyolite now stands, and
during the winter an unusual quantity
of rain fell. One day there was snow,
but that melted before noon of the
day following.
Flowers Bloom in Desert
Last spring and summer there was
more rain in the Bullfrog district than
there had ever been known before.
The hills and even the desert valleys
blossomed in wild flowers.
The summer heat was lessened. The
hot winds from across Death valley
gave place in a marked degree to cool
holes in the desert that had never been
known to remain full after the middle
of April We're replenished by the June,
July and September rains, so that in
spite of the heat, prospecting through
Death valley was continued even dur
| ing the summer months.
| Last fall the rains came early and
on November 20 the first real winter
that Southern Nevada ever has known
set in with rain and snow.
Since that time the snow has never
disappeared from the Rhyolite hills and
fog, with promise of either rain or
snow, hangs continually over the noun
tain tops.
More than three feet of snow has
fallen in the desert below Greenwater
and for four days snow fell in Death
valley, where moisture of any kind
has been practically, unknown.
With the foreknowledge that the
summer will deal leniently with the
prospector roads have been built across
Death valley to the California mining
camps, a railroad is being built along
it's edges and permanent camps have
been built at Stovepipe and Emigrant
springs.
There is now in preparation a bill
for the Nevada Legislature asking for
an appropriation of $4,000 with which
to plant water sign posts in the more
"a
viii Increase Rainfall
The building of the wagon road
across Death valley, the coming of the
Tonopah and Tidewater extension of
the Santa Fe, the Las Vegas and Tono-
pah extension of the Salt Lake and
the Tonopah and Goldfield branch of
the Central Pacific, the Introduction
of the automobiles in the desert, the
boring of wells, and above all, the rise
of the Salton sea are tanning the desert.
There is much yet to be done, but
the end of the work Is in sight, for
the rains mean that sage brush will
take the place of the cacti, that scrub
oak and bunch grass will take the
place of the sage brush.
Then, just as in Algiers, where the
French government reclaimed waste
ground and brought increased rainfall
| by the planting and irrigating of
scrub pines, the increase Of vegetation
in the Nevada desert will in turn in
crease the rainfall.
Irrigation of the low countries will
| be made possible. Towns will take the
place of mining camps and in the end
! the desert will be tanned.